It’s complicated: https://news.mit.edu/2025/decarbonizing-steel-tough-as-steel...

This is one of the stronger arguments for a carbon tax: if you can’t ignore externalities, people have strong incentives to use less (e.g. buying a car instead of an SUV or biking) and all of the alternative fuel and process work is going to be easier if the cost comparison is more even.

Thanks for the link. I read about electric arc furnaces reprocessing scrap steel somewhere else recently. Do we really never need virgin steel again, we already have all we need?