Shougang has commissioned an industrial-scale carbon capture facility at its Jingtang steelmaking complex in Caofeidian, in China's Tangshan steelmaking heartland, under its partnership with Rio Tinto. The unit can process up to 3,000 cubic metres of blast furnace gas per hour and capture up to 10,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide each year.

The commissioning follows a smaller-scale blast furnace carbon capture facility built in 2024 as part of the phased technology development programme run jointly by the two companies. The partners say using waste heat from existing steelmaking operations has the potential to further reduce carbon capture costs at the site.

From pilot to industrial scale

The new unit sits within a longer carbon-recycling effort at Jingtang that dates to 2018, when Shougang started up bioethanol production using captured carbon from the steel mill as feedstock. That work runs through Shougang Lanzatech, a China-based joint venture with US technology partner LanzaTech, which initially produced synthetic vehicle fuel and has continued to commercialise its products.

The capture milestone comes scarcely three months after Shougang Lanzatech announced completion of the world's first demonstration project for the biosynthesis of anhydrous ethanol from blast furnace offgases — its Hebei Shouland Phase II project. In June 2026, the company reported the breakthrough, producing anhydrous ethanol at 99.9% concentration, and said it had entered commercial operations. In late September 2026, Shougang Lanzatech exhibited its products at the 2026 China Metallurgical Exhibition.

Shougang Group Vice President Zhu Guosen framed the capture unit as a demonstration for the conventional steelmaking route. "This achievement represents an important milestone for blast furnace decarbonisation and provides valuable demonstration value for reducing emissions in the conventional steelmaking route," Zhu said. "The project has effectively addressed key challenges associated with carbon reduction in the blast furnace process… Looking ahead, we will continue to optimise the technology, advance the utilisation of captured carbon resources, and contribute to the green and low-carbon transformation of the steel industry."

Utilisation paths under review

Rio Tinto and Shougang are exploring ways to use the captured CO₂, including converting it into syngas that can be recycled back into the steelmaking process, reducing the amount of new carbon needed to make steel. Shougang is also actively investigating captured carbon-rich offgases as feedstock for bioethanol production through the LanzaTech joint venture.

Rio Tinto Iron Ore Sales and Marketing Vice President Ramona Sim placed the project within the miner's three-decade relationship with the steelmaker. "This milestone is an important step in our 30-year relationship with Shougang and our work together to find practical ways to reduce emissions from steelmaking," Sim said. "Steelmakers are exploring a range of technologies to lower emissions from existing blast furnace operations, and carbon capture and utilisation could play a key role as these technologies continue to develop."

The Shougang collaboration is one strand of Rio Tinto's broader decarbonisation portfolio. The miner is working with Caterpillar on 220-tonne zero-emission autonomous haul trucks, partnered with Prysmian in March 2026 on an industrial trial to produce low-carbon aluminium cables for the data centre market, and is participating in a three-year US Department of Energy ARPA-E-funded project exploring the carbon storage potential of the Tamarack nickel joint venture in central Minnesota.

For blast furnace operators, the Jingtang unit is a working test of whether capture costs can fall enough to retrofit the conventional route at scale. The next milestones to track are the partners' optimisation of the capture technology and a commercial decision on utilisation — syngas recycling versus bioethanol feedstock — which will determine whether the 10,000-tonne-per-year unit becomes a template or a one-off demonstration.