AUTOMOTIVE APPLICATIONS COUNCIL OF AISI’S SMDI NAMED FINALIST
IN AMERICAN METAL MARKET’S 2010 AWARDS FOR STEEL EXCELLENCE
Business unit selected as a
finalist in the environmental responsibility / stewardship category for
its UltraLight Steel initiatives
 DETROIT, June 18, 2010 – In recognition of its research initiative to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions and improve fuel economy, the Automotive Applications
Council of American Iron and Steel Institute’s (AISI) Steel Market
Development Institute (SMDI) has been named a finalist for American
Metal Market’s 2010 Awards for Steel Excellence in the
environmental responsibility / stewardship category. The group will be
honored at a ceremony and dinner June 22 in New
York City during the Steel
Success Strategies conference.
“The steel industry has a
long history of environmental stewardship, constantly reinventing our
plants and our products for the lowest environmental impacts possible.
The Ultralight projects are just one example of how we extend these
environmental gains to our customers and consumers,” Larry
Kavanagh, president of AISI’s SMDI, said. “Our goal is to
help automakers deliver vehicles with the lowest CO2 impact
over their life cycle.”
The Automotive Applications
Council was selected as a finalist for its UltraLight Steel Automotive
initiatives, which consist of four research projects designed to
revolutionize steel-intensive vehicle designs. The initiatives
demonstrated automakers could significantly reduce greenhouse gas
emissions and fuel consumption by reducing vehicle weight while
maintaining safety and affordability through lightweighting with steel.
The projects proved a weight reduction of 25 to 34 percent is attainable
through the use of advanced high-strength steels.
“The UltraLight Steel
Automotive initiatives were a $40 million investment by the
international steel industry and revolutionized the way steel was used
in vehicle applications,” Ron Krupitzer, vice president of
Automotive Applications for SMDI, said. “The project showed for
every 1 million vehicles made according to these designs, an estimated
2.1 million tons of CO2 emissions and 171.3 million gallons
of fuel per year could be saved.”
Krupitzer added that the
UltraLight Steel Automotive initiatives laid the groundwork for other
technical advancements, including the current FutureSteelVehicle
project, which aims to decrease a vehicle’s structural weight by
at least 35 percent, thereby further reducing fuel consumption and total
lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions.
American Metal Market’s
inaugural awards recognize pioneering efforts that companies or
institutions have taken to improve competitiveness and demonstrate
excellence in their operations across 12 distinct categories: best
innovation; best operational improvements; environmental responsibility
/ stewardship; logistics / transportation provider of the year; best
mergers and acquisitions; industry ambassador / advocate of the year;
steel producer of the year; service center of the year; scrap company of
the year; biggest impact on market over the decade; best turnaround of
the decade; and “titan of steel” (over the past 25
years).
Finalists were selected based on an evaluation by a panel of steel
industry experts and executives. Winners in each category will be
announced during the Steel Success Strategies conference.
The Steel Market Development Institute (SMDI), a business unit of the
American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI), grows and maintains the use of
steel through strategies that promote cost-effective solutions in the
automotive, construction and container markets, as well as for
new-growth opportunities in non-traditional steel markets. The
Automotive Applications Council is a part of the SMDI and focuses on
advancing the use of steel in the highly competitive automotive market.
For more news or information, visit www.autosteel.org.
Automotive Applications Council investors are:
- AK Steel Corporation
- ArcelorMittal Dofasco
- ArcelorMittal USA
- Nucor Corporation
- Severstal North America
- United States Steel Corporation
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