What the pilot plant has actually made
Since 2020, a pilot plant in Lulea, Sweden has produced more than 5,000 tonnes of iron made by stripping oxygen from iron ore with hydrogen instead of the fossil fuel that step usually burns, a process called direct reduction. The pilot is run by 3 companies working together as a project named HYBRIT, the steelmaker SSAB, the mining company LKAB and the power company Vattenfall. In July 2021, SSAB rolled that iron into the first steel plate made with the hydrogen version of the process.
The Lulea figure is tonnes actually produced since 2020. The Gallivare figures are targets for a demonstration plant that no source here confirms is under construction yet.
Show the numbers
| Actually produced since 2020 at the Lulea pilot plant | 5,000 |
| Targeted by 2026 at the Gallivare demonstration plant | 1,300,000 |
| Targeted by 2030 at the Gallivare demonstration plant | 2,700,000 |
That September, on September 1, 2021, SSAB announced a partnership with Mercedes Benz, the 1 named carmaker in this record. What Mercedes Benz actually received was not a finished car. An announcement from SSAB called them prototype parts for a car body, planned for delivery the following year.
We are extremely happy to welcome Mercedes Benz as a partner for fossil free steel products.
Martin Lindqvist, President and Chief Executive Officer of SSAB. Source 1.
Volvo Group is also named as an early customer of steel from the same pilot plant, but Volvo Group builds trucks and construction equipment, not passenger cars, and no source names a specific Volvo Group vehicle.
The emissions number behind the pilot
An August 2024 report from SSAB measured what the swap to hydrogen actually changes. Producing a tonne of directly reduced iron with hydrogen releases 42 kilograms of what SSAB calls biogenic carbon dioxide, meaning carbon dioxide counted as part of the renewable cycle rather than from a fossil fuel. The same tonne made with a conventional natural gas process releases 383 kilograms of fossil carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide released from burning a fossil fuel. That is a cut of about 89%, a MAOWCE calculation from the 2 figures SSAB gives for the same measurement.
Both figures are SSAB tested results for the same measurement, per tonne of directly reduced iron. The hydrogen figure is what SSAB calls biogenic carbon dioxide, counted as part of the renewable cycle rather than from a fossil fuel.
Show the numbers
| Hydrogen route | 42 |
| Natural gas route | 383 |
The plant still being built for that scale
The next step up for HYBRIT is a demonstration plant at Gallivare, Sweden, and its site was chosen in March 2021. It is targeted to deliver 1.3 million tonnes of sponge iron by 2026, rising to 2.7 million tonnes by 2030. None of the 5 sources checked here confirm that plant is under construction yet, only that a research report on the finished pilot phase was delivered in August 2024. Until it ships tonnage, the 1.3 million and 2.7 million tonne figures are targets, not steel already made.
A separate company, further behind
Stegra, a different company from HYBRIT that used to be named H2 Green Steel, is building its own plant in Boden, Sweden, aimed at 2.5 million tonnes of steel a year. In June 2023, Stegra agreed to sell Mercedes Benz about 50,000 tonnes of steel a year from that plant for its European production. As of a report dated January 21, 2026, the Boden plant was 60% built, had shipped no steel at all, and Stegra was still seeking more than 1,000,000,000 dollars in financing to finish it.