$500M boost for ArcelorMittal Dofasco secures future steel jobs for Hamilton, province says

Ontario's quest to replace coal-fed coke ovens and blast furnaces with new, low-emission technology got a major boost on Tuesday, with the province contributing up to $500 million in loan and grant support to Hamilton's ArcelorMittal Dofasco plant.

Premier Doug Ford and company officials said the investment will help transform the province into a world-leading producer of green steel. This will boost the province's robust auto parts supply chain and skilled workforce in communities with deep roots in steel manufacturing, they said, to help meet the global demand for low-carbon auto production. 

"Hamilton is steel town," Ford said at a Tuesday morning news conference at the ArcelorMittal Dofasco plant.

The city, he said, already makes "some of the finest steel in the entire world," and will soon be able to add "cleanest" steel to that designation.

"What this does, it gives every single person here — 4,600 [employees] — certainty, for decades," Ford said.

"…Because of our government's actions, Ontario will be a major player in getting the low-emission vehicles of the future built here in Ontario, and steel, clean steel, will be a critical ingredient."

Ron Bedard, president and CEO of ArcelorMittal Dofasco, said the investment puts the company on a path to low-carbon, sustainable steel.

Bedard said today's announcement "sends a signal that Hamilton is a centre of steel making, safety and excellence, and a key part of Ontario's economy, and that it's an industry that can help achieve our climate change goals." 

Meanwhile, Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade, Vic Fedeli said the investment in green-steel manufacturing "will give auto makers and other industries yet another reason to buy Ontario and hire Ontario workers when they look to transform their supply chain."

"This Hamilton plant will be among the first in ArcelorMittal's global operations to replace blast furnaces with electric arc furnaces … The bottom line is this, if the car of the future is going to be electric, then the steel it's made with needs to be electric, too," Fedeli said.

"With this … investment, the car of the future will also be low carbon before it even rolls off the assembly line. It's a major turning point for the Ontario global auto sector."

ArcelorMittal Dofasco — Canada's largest flat-rolled steel producer, and Hamilton's largest private-sector employer, employing about 4,600 people — has produced steel in Hamilton for more than 100 years.

Last July, the federal government announced $400 million for a project at ArcelorMittal Dofasco that the company says will help it cut carbon emissions by more than half.

The government said its investment is part of a $1.765-billion project to phase out coal-fired steel making and is expected to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to three million tonnes per year by 2030. The goal is to have the project completed by 2028.

TAF: Hamilton has largest per capita emissions in GTHA

Meanwhile, in its most recent report the Atmospheric Fund (TAF), a regional climate agency that focuses on the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, said Hamilton has the largest per capita emissions in the GTHA. 

Additionally, TAF has highlighted the following:

• 53 per cent of Hamilton's emissions come from industry, representing 55.6 per cent of the GTHA's industrial emissions.
• Emissions decreased less than one per cent in 2019 and 13.6 per cent in 2020. The 2020 decrease is a result of pandemic-related impacts and expected to be temporary. 
• Hamilton had a moderate drop in emissions from transportation in 2020 when compared to other regions.

On its website, the City of Hamilton said the impacts of climate change not only cause millions of dollars of infrastructure damage, but damage homes and businesses, and put people at increased risk to their health and safety.

The city said climate change is seen locally in the increased frequency and severity of heat waves causing drought, and the increased severity and frequency of storms, heavy precipitation leading to flooding, shoreline and escarpment erosion. 

Hamilton is on a mission to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.