Low-Carbon Steel: What’s Driving Automotive Adoption?

The Low-Carbon Steel Automotive Manufacturing Survey 2026 was conducted by Automotive Manufacturing Solutions (AMS) in partnership with SSAB, a leading provider of low-carbon steel, to gather insights from a global audience of automotive professionals, including OEMs, tier suppliers, and other industry stakeholders.

The survey captured an industry at an inflection point, whereby sustainability is rapidly progressing from aspiration to mainstream practice. Whilst automotive manufacturing remains heavily reliant upon steel, it remains one of the most energy-intensive materials to produce, therefore making the decarbonisation of steel production central to the automotive sector’s broader sustainability journey.

For this article we drilled down into one of the key highlights of the survey findings – What’s driving the move to low-carbon steel:

Low-carbon steel adoption led by internal carbon reduction strategy, supported by regulatory compliance considerations

Moving beyond broader sustainability objectives and drilling down into the primary driving forces for automotive manufacturing companies moving towards low-carbon steel, the results were revealing of the subtly differing dynamics at play.

Notably, internal net-zero / carbon reduction commitments were the dominant factor, followed by brand / reputational considerations. Of note, investor / ESG pressure also featured as a significant factor in purchasing strategy for low-carbon steel. These findings would strongly indicate that moving to low-carbon steel is first and foremost a conscious choice used to enhance company image, and is being supported by environmental regulatory compliance, rather than being regulatory driven.

The list of other regulatory factors supporting the adoption of low-carbon steel included Customer or OEM contractual requirements, national / regional regulation, and the various regulatory systems including CSRD, CBAM, SBTi etc.

Sustainability considerations and low-carbon steel are clearly very high up the agenda for the majority of automotive companies. This finding was supported by respondents reporting that sustainability aspects are considered in at least 93% of cases (slightly, moderately, quite a lot, and very much) when choosing a steel supplier. Only 7% reported not at all illustrating that sustainability is no longer a minority pursuit but is now very much a mainstream objective among automotive manufacturers.

This point was confirmed by the survey respondents reporting the stage their companies were at in implementing low-carbon steel within automotive manufacturing.

The vast majority of respondents, totalling 71% (moderately, quite advanced or fully implemented), indicated that implementation levels for low-carbon steel are deeply integrated within current purchasing strategies.

Interestingly, only a small proportion of 15% where at the early / pilot stages.  And only 8% indicated Not at all illustrating a very low rate of non-implementation across the industry which is encouraging.

Of course, implementing low-carbon steel has many challenges, and there are acknowledged difficulties in measuring the gains. Specifically in terms of tracking of carbon emissions, the survey painted a mixed picture with a slight majority either working towards this or having full traceability of carbon per tonne. Notably though, around 16% rely on industry averages or regulatory default values to estimate the emissions, which is far from ideal. And only a small proportion do not currently track this.

The paints a picture of a less than satisfactory range of emission tracking systems that are incomplete, inaccurate or are simply estimates, and therefore cannot be entirely relied upon to track and thereby minimise emissions content of the steel being procured, so clearly there is some work to do on this front.