BILSTEIN GROUP hydrogen supply

Groupe BILSTEIN

REPLACING NATURAL GAS WITH HYDROGEN IN STEEL MANUFACTURING

Fact sheet

  • Services: M&E
  • Subsidiary: SPIE Germany Switzerland Austria
  • Year: 2023
  • Tags: Energy_Transition, Hydrogen
  • Status: Completed

SPIE’s hydrogen-based energy supply system enabled carbon-neutral heat treatment for BILSTEIN GROUP’s pioneering cold steel strip production plant in Hagen, Germany.

BILSTEIN GROUP, a world leader in cold strip manufacturing, aims to replace natural gas with hydrogen in the energy-intensive processes needed to produce cold-rolled steel strip. The strip must be heated to 500-800°C until it becomes ductile enough for downstream processing (e.g., for automotive applications). Switching from natural gas to hydrogen is extremely challenging, because to achieve equivalent performance, hydrogen must be supplied in much greater quantities. 

SPIE installed an onsite hydrogen supply system for an entire heating mantle with 11 burners—a total heat output of 1,800 kW—with no loss of performance. With safety as a top priority, SPIE specially designed the equipment to withstand a high-pressure hydrogen flow of over 600 m3 per hour from the system to the plant.

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“ The project was a complete success. During the pilot run alone, we avoided emitting some 3.7 tonnes of CO2.”
Christian Hagenkord, Head of Sustainability Projects and Energy Supply / BILSTEIN GROUP
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Key figure

100 tonnes

The pilot project applied the hydrogen-based energy solution to heat around 100 tonnes of cold strip in the batch annealing plant.

Key figure

3.7 tonnes

of CO2 avoided

Key figure

25,000 tonnes

BILSTEIN GROUP targets a complete switch to hydrogen. This could save 25,000 tonnes of CO2—the equivalent of the annual consumption of around 2,300 people.