Tata Steel has signed one of the UK’s biggest ever industrial energy supply contracts with npower, which will provide energy to 22 Tata Steel plants across the UK.
The contract equates to a supply of approximately 5 terawatt hours (TWh) of energy, enough to power 1,260,000 homes – more than the number of households in Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Coventry and Bradford combined.
Volker Beckers, CEO of RWE npower, said: “Tata Steel is Europe’s second largest steel producer with most of its operations based in the UK, so it is a major coup for npower to be the energy partner of a company at the heart of UK industry. The sheer scale of this supply contract demonstrates how energy plays a crucial role in supporting business and the UK economy.”
Dr Karl-Ulrich Köhler, managing director and CEO of Tata Steel Europe, said: “We operate in a very volatile and challenging energy environment nowadays, so it is vital that the energy supply chain in the UK is fit for purpose. We need an energy supplier committed to managing our requirements in terms of continuity of supply, delivered costs and service, and we have been impressed by the way npower has demonstrated enthusiasm and capability to meet those requirements.”
Tata Steel is also committed to investing in technologies that help manage its own carbon emissions as well as those of its customers. In partnership with the Low Carbon Research Institute and the Welsh Assembly Government, the company recently unveiled a new research centre, the Sustainable Building Envelope Centre (SBEC), dedicated to developing low-carbon, low-energy sustainable construction technologies.
