During operation, production and hot processing plants need to be cooled using water, which we avoid wasting by controlling consumption continually. Managing water resources is of course regulated, and water is subject to a monitoring plan involving analysis by accredited laboratories, to ensure compliance with legislative limits on discharges into surface water bodies.

Our aim is to reduce the use of water through the optimal operation of cooling circuits, and to purify water released from plants.

Thanks to closed circuits in all plants, continuously recycling water prevents its use from having significant environmental impact. At the Lonato, Calvisano and Nave facilities, water is drawn directly from groundwater using wells. At the Riesa site it is drawn from the council water supply and in lesser amounts than from wells. To comply with Grundwasserverordnung legislation, German companies must monitor groundwater every two years. ESF Elbe-Stahlwerke Feralpi has therefore positioned metres on the shortest sides of its groundwater perimeter to calculate water coming in and out, to make a comparison and understand the corresponding impact.

To reduce consumption we use rainwater

Rainwater is collected on all impermeable surfaces and treated in purification plants. Some of the water is then used in the industrial process. In 2019 a tank was constructed in Riesa to collect rainwater for cooling black slag. Surplus water is collected in on-site sewage networks, sent to the purification plant, and released into the surface water body at the sites of Lonato, Calvisano and Nave, and the council sewage network at the Riesa site. The implementation of a new rainwater collection plant is scheduled at the Nave site in 2021.