Member of the Steel Tube Institute Conduit Committee manufacture rigid steel conduit, intermediate metal conduit, electrical metallic tubing, PVC coated rigid steel conduit, and associated elbows, couplings and nipples.

Unlike other materials, steel contains recycled material and is also fully recyclable.  In fact, according to the Steel Recycling Institute (SRI), steel is the world’s most recycled material. 

The amount of recycled material in our steel products depends upon the process used by our various steel suppliers.  If the pipe is made from a steel coil that comes from a steel mini-mill, then the scrap or recycled content of the steel is between 95-100% because mini-mills use a technology called "electric arc furnace" (EAF) that allows them to use up to 100% scrap.  If the pipe is made from a steel coil that comes from an integrated mill, then the scrap or recycled content of the steel is about 30% because integrated mills use a technology called "basic oxygen furnace" (BOF) that restricts the use of scrap steel to no more than 30%.

Both the EAF and the BOF methods provide an enhanced environmental benefit.  One is not environmentally superior to the other, since they are both complementary parts of the total interlocking infrastructure of steelmaking, product manufacture, scrap generation and recycling, as explained on the Steel Recycling Institute’s website. 

We understand that our products exceed the 10% and 20% goals in LEED Version 2.2, regardless of which type of steel is used in the manufacturing of the product.

Since we cannot track the type of process used in the product of the steel we buy, the best we can do is to provide a range of percentages from the Steel Recycling Institute.  Total recycled content ranges from 31.6%- 94.7%.  For post consumer the range is 23.5% - 57.5% and for pre-consumer (called post-industrial in LEED Version 2.1) it is from 6.4% - 32.5%.

The additional “green” aspect of our steel products is what the Steel Recycling Institute terms the “reclamation rate”.  Currently LEED only considers the recycled content of a product, not how much can be reclaimed at the end of the service life or from jobsite scrap.  Steel conduit is especially exceptional relative to “reclamation rate.”  Four major factors account for this:

• The service life is very long. (There is steel rigid conduit still in use after more that sixty years.)
• Conductors can be removed and new conductors installed.
• Additional circuits can frequently be added in the same conduit.
• When the conduit is finally discarded, it is virtually totally recyclable.

You may want to review two articles by the Steel Recycling Institute (www.recycle-steel.org) for further information.  The two segments are “Steel Takes LEED with Recycled Content” and “Modern Steel Production Technologies”.

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