The Government is "pressuring" Brussels to receive the go-ahead for the future plan for ArcelorMittal

MADRID, 19 Sep. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, Reyes Maroto, has affirmed that the Government of Spain is "pressuring" Brussels to receive the go-ahead for the decarbonisation plan for the plants in Asturias and the Basque Country of ArcelorMittal, a company that last week raised a Temporary Employment Regulation File (ERTE) for its workers in Spain that would apply until 2023.

At an Informative Breakfast organized by Europa Press, Maroto indicated that they are working with ArcelorMittal on a decarbonization project for their entire industrial chain to produce green steel, "a project that looks to the future and is being evaluated by the European Commission."

For this reason, he assured that Brussels is being "insisted" for its approval and transmitting "its urgency", since what the workers "need to know is that there is a project for the future and that the Government is going to accompany it".

In this regard, Maroto recalled that last May he signed an agreement in Davos (Switzerland) with the CEO of ArcelorMittal, Aditya Mittal, to advance this plan. "We are putting pressure on the EU so that this project, linked to green hydrogen, is approved," he said.

Specifically, it is a public-private investment project that has the support of the Government of Spain and the Government of Asturias and represents a fundamental step in the consolidation of productive capacities for the manufacture of steel with more sustainable technologies, which will contribute to the decarbonisation process of this electro-intensive sector.

The agreement establishes that the Ministry of Industry, within the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, will provide financing for the construction of an electric furnace in Gijón, a direct reduction plant for iron ore (DRI) with green hydrogen in that same facility and the possibility of a new electric oven in Avilés.