Damaged military equipment will not be profitable to sell for scrap - BBC

More than a million tons of military scrap metal have been collected over the year and a half of war in Ukraine. This metal is not accepted by recycling centers and metallurgical plants, the BBC reports.

High-alloy steel, which is used to make armored vehicles, is needed in Ukraine. In the EU, such raw materials cost up to €3,000 per ton, and in Ukraine, where there is an increasing supply every day, recycling will not even pay off and will not bring benefits.

This is due to the complexity of the technical process – destroyed equipment contains hazardous materials and weapons, and special equipment is needed to process high-alloy steel with impurities.

"Destroyed military equipment is not very interesting for metallurgical production because it is a raw material that requires additional processing, and in addition to the usual processing, it also needs additional measures: sanitation and demilitarization," says Dmitry Terekhov, Director of the Steelmaking Department at AMKR.

A ton of high-alloyed pure metal in Ukraine costs 150 euros, while in the EU it costs up to 3,000 euros per ton.

"A burnt-out tank is not yet scrap metal. The cost of processing this scrap metal – for example, we studied this on the example of a T-72 tank – is about UAH 6,000, including the processing itself. But our metallurgical companies buy scrap metal at the plant, which is used for steel production, at almost the same price," explains Oleksandr Sheiko, head of the expert and scientific council of the Ukrainian Association of Secondary Metals. – "Therefore, the high costs of processing this military scrap do not allow it to be sold freely on the market.

In addition, the publication notes, most of the destroyed Russian equipment is material evidence in the case of Russian aggression against Ukraine, and the investigation can last for years.