A potential full EU ban on scrap exports would hurt Turkey, Colakoglu Meturlarji chief executive Ugur Dalbeler said during the Kallanish Flat Steel 2021 virtual conference on Tuesday.

“All that it [EU] has done so far is not fair to a trade partner [Turkey] for the past 25 years,” Dalbeler observed. “For the last 20 years, Europe has enjoyed the benefits of having a free trade partner and they made billions of dollars with trade with Turkey. And then the EU started with new safeguards and squeezing it in order to stop Turkey’s development.”

“If the EU bans scrap exports, which will be illegal based on World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules, I believe that will be the end of relations between Europe and Turkey,” Dalbeler asserted. “That will be like a declaration of war.”

According to Dalbeler, the most efficient way to good relations between the two regions is trade, so putting up more and more obstacles will only negatively impact relations.

“I have heard rumours about such a possible ban from the EU, but I think it is highly unlikely to happen, but in our world today everything is possible,” noted Stemcor managing director for distribution Dick Sands. “Sadly, we have now pretty extreme politicians in the US and Europe, who don’t mind breaking WTO rules.”

At the same time, rising energy costs have also had a big impact on steel production in Turkey. This is because the nation depends on imports of energy resources due to the lack of coal from neighbouring countries like Russia, Azerbaijan, Iran and others, Dalbeler explained.

“Energy prices in Turkey have doubled since the beginning of the year and I believe this trend will continue in the next 4-5 months, so we can expect shortages from the energy sector,” he continued.

Future investments into decarbonisation of the Turkish steel industry will not come from the government, but only from domestic steelmakers, Dalbeler added. “They haven’t received a penny from the state in the last decades and this will be the case in achieving more green steel production,” he commented. “At least 75% of the output relies on scrap and the rest on iron ore, so this is an advantage.”

At this stage it is difficult to say how the use of hydrogen will be developed, especially in Turkey, Dalbeler concluded.