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ArcelorMittal and North Sea Port go circular in Flanders

In Flanders, North Sea Port Ghent and ArcelorMittal will jointly develop a business park called North-C Circular. The goal is to prepare this 150-hectare site for construction, equip it with basic infrastructure such as utilities, make it accessible by road, rail and water, and fill it with companies focusing on circular activities. With this initiative, North Sea Port Ghent and ArcelorMittal are taking a new step toward the goal of achieving climate neutrality by 2050.

North Sea Port Ghent

Toward climate neutrality

A brownfield covenant for North-C Circular is in the making between North Sea Port, ArcelorMittal Belgium and the Government of Flanders. Once the business park is completed, it can house a variety of economic activities that focus on reducing carbon emissions, the energy transition from fossil to renewable resources, the circular economy and collaborations with companies in the area. These companies can then contribute to making the port and ArcelorMittal Belgium climate neutral by 2050.

North Sea Port must be climate neutral by 2050. By 2025, we already want to capture 3 million tons of CO2 for storage and reuse. And by 2030, we aim to reduce carbon emissions by half to move to a complete reduction by 2050.

Daan Schalck
CEO of North Sea Port

In addition, North Sea Port Ghent wants to have 150 hectares of land ready for circular projects by 2025. By then, the port also wants to attract 10 circular activities with innovative technologies or processes that should allow sectors such as the chemical and steel industries to support the transition toward the port’s climate neutrality.

Three-pronged plan

Meanwhile, ArcelorMittal Belgium – which is part of the Luxembourgish ArcelorMittal Group – is implementing an action plan to cut carbon emissions by 35% by 2030 and become climate neutral by 2050. This action plan consists of 3 pillars:

  1. further enhancing material and energy efficiency
  2. fully embracing hydrogen as a reducing agent
  3. further developing “smart carbon” concepts

ArcelorMittal Belgium is passionate about circularity and plays a leading role in the industry in terms of climate transition. The development of North-C Circular is a crucial step in the further development of our ‘smart carbon’ concepts.

Manfred Van Vlierberghe
CEO of ArcelorMittal Belgium

Construction kick-off by the end of 2024

Before moving forward with North-C Circular, ArcelorMittal and North Sea Port will organize an information and public participation event for local citizens and businesses in the spring of 2023. The brownfield covenant is expected to be finalized by the summer of the same year. Currently, the site preparation, dredging activities, basic infrastructure construction and business park development are planned to kick off in late 2024. The complete project will take about 10 years to complete.

More info

North Sea Port
Reported by
North Sea Port website
7 February 2023

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