Aperam has signed an agreement to supply clean titanium scrap metal to IperionX for its low-carbon titanium metal facility in Virginia, USA.

Aperam is a stainless steel and speciality steel producer with facilities in Brazil, Belgium and France. Aperam Recycling’s subsidiary ELG Utica Alloys plans to provide the titanium scrap metal to IperionX. IperionX uses Hydrogen Assisted Metallothermic Reduction (HAMR) to process titanium oxide into titanium metal and is planning to use scrap metal as feedstock for its 125tpy demonstration plant in Virginia, USA. The company needs over US$6M initially for the demonstration plant and a further US$70M to scale up to over 1,000tpy, with the demonstration plant planned for commissioning in Q1 2024.

While used in a wide variety of industrial and commercial applications, the aerospace industry is the largest demand sector for titanium. Both jet engine parts and aeroplane frames are important applications for titanium, accounting for over 40% of global titanium demand since 2013 according to Project Blue data. However, the grounding of the Boeing Max in 2019 following two fatal crashes and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns saw demand fall back to below 30%. Demand is yet to recover.

Revenue passenger kilometres (RPKs), a measure of air traffic, is starting to ramp up again, which will initially translate to a return in maintenance for jet engines and other parts, recovering demand for superalloy materials. Orders for new aircrafts, however, are still trailing below their historical levels and are only expected to return to above the 2018 peak by 2025.