If you are not recycling ferrous steel, you should be. Ferrous steel recycling services are paying top dollar for all ferrous steel brought to their plants. Why is this metal such a big deal to the recycling world, you might ask? There are actually plenty of good reasons why.
Iron Is the Second-Most Valuable Commodity in the World
"Ferrous" refers to iron, as iron is identified as "Fe" on the periodic table of elements. Iron is the second-most valuable commodity in the world, seconded only by the world's consumption of oil and fossil fuels. Iron is used for everything from buildings to cars to boats and ships to planes. Without iron, steel does not exist, and without steel, almost no mode of transportation and no buildings higher than a couple of stories would exist either. Every country wants and needs iron to produce ferrous steel to produce every kind of structure and mobile transport there is.
Iron Is Common, but It Is More Costly to Mine Than to Recycle
Think about it; when you mine iron ore from the ground, it takes thousands of dollars to dig it out of iron ore mines, ship it, refine it, and then create "pig iron," which is then used to create steel. When ferrous steel is recycled, it is already in the form necessary to produce more steel without all of the processing needed to turn it into steel. That makes it much cheaper to melt down and reshape, remold, and/or recast into whatever steel products are needed. Even though iron ore is a very common element, and it is not likely to run out anytime soon, it is cheaper and less harmful to the environment to just recycle the ferrous steel scrap that already exists.
Environmental Concerns Push for Recycled Steel
A steel building structure exists, abandoned. If somebody buys that lot, the steel can either be left in situ and expanded upon, or it can be torn down and recycled. When a mine is created, hundreds of thousands of pounds of rock and dirt are removed from one area, devastating the natural environment in order to get to the iron ore underground. None of that environment can be put back once the iron ore mine is open for business. Given the state of the global natural environment, it just makes sense to keep recycling the steel that sits available for scrap and recycling than to tear new holes in the ground looking for this ore.
For more information, contact a company like Beartown Recycling.
Share