The Fortescue Metals Group Ltd (ASX: FMG) share price is up 0.9% in Friday morning trade.
The S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) iron ore stock closed yesterday at $20.43. Shares are currently trading for $20.51 apiece.
For some context, the S&P/ASX 200 Resource Index (ASX: XJR) is down 0.03% at this same time.
What's happening on the green iron front?
The Fortescue share price is marching higher amid news that the ASX 200 miner's green arm, Fortescue Future Industries (FFI), has made a big step forward in producing 'green iron'.
Some 6% of global carbon emissions are estimated to come from the conversion of iron ore into iron using traditional methods reliant on coal. Newer technologies are also trialling the use of hydrogen.
But the novel process developed by a team of FFI scientists at a pilot plant in Western Australia just turned iron ore into iron (or 'green iron' if you prefer)
As The Australian Financial Review reports, the still-veiled process is electrochemical.
Research breakthrough
Last month, Fortescue CEO Andrew Forrest alluded to the work being carried out by the FFI research team, calling it a "major breakthrough".
Forrest said, "It uses a membrane". As for Fortescue's competitors, he added, "They're going to have to come and talk to us if they want to borrow the membrane."
However, FFI's scientists said the successful test production of green iron was more about the 100 different innovations they'd developed and put together than the membrane.
"Essentially, it is all bespoke. You couldn't go to Bunnings and buy part x, y, z because this process didn't exist," an FFI scientist said.
Of course, FFI's test production of 150 kilograms is a far cry from producing emissions-free iron on a commercial scale.
"150 kilograms is better than it being a science project, but it's not scale … so early days. It's still going to take a lot of work to scale it, but this is part of our journey," FFI CEO Mark Hutchinson said.
What could it mean?
Should that journey prove successful and commercially viable, it could have a big impact on keeping the lid on global warming. Future success could also offer some heady tailwinds for the Fortescue share price.
According to Hutchinson (quoted by the AFR), the Pilbara situated pilot plant would be the ideal place to make it all happen:
When you start to scale it to say 100,000 tonnes, there is an enormous amount of renewable energy you need to do it.
If there's anywhere you could do it, it is the Pilbara because you have the opportunity to build massive scale renewable energy that could convert iron ore to iron, and then you basically sell the decarbonised chips to China.
Fortescue share price snapshot
As you can see in the chart below, the Fortescue share price has had a good run over the past 12 months, up 9%.
