This founder is making cheaper, cleaner steel
This founder is making cheaper, cleaner steel
摘要: 2026 Innovators Under 35
View all the innovators
Climate change and energy
This founder is making cheaper, cleaner steel
Laureen Meroueh developed
正文
2026 Innovators Under 35
View all the innovators
Climate change and energy
This founder is making cheaper, cleaner steel
Laureen Meroueh developed a method that cuts the costs—and the emissions—of steelmaking.
Bridget Reed Morawski
archive page
September 8, 2026
Affiliation:
Hertha Metals
MIRANDA BARNES
The steel industry isn’t exactly known for innovation. Very little has changed about purifying iron ore since the process was invented and commercialized in the 1850s.
The majority of steelmakers melt solid iron ore at dizzyingly high temperatures inside blast furnaces, where the material reacts with gases to trigger chemical reactions that remove oxygen. It then undergoes further refining to purify it before it is made into products like rebar and car frames.
The process relies on coal, and it generates roughly 7% of the carbon emissions that drive climate change—about as much as the fashion industry. Decarbonization has proved difficult: Profit margins are tight and furnaces have long service lives, making investment tough to justify.
Now Laureen Meroueh may have found a way to clean up steelmaking without driving up the price. Meroueh, the founder of Hertha Metals, invented a new furnace that simplifies the chemistry behind the process. Her method turns iron ore into refined liquid steel in a single step, and it swaps coal for natural gas. Together, those changes slash emissions by at least half, she says, and cut costs by 25% compared with steelmaking business as usual.
If it catches on, the tech could be transformative. “There’s huge value in reducing the size of this production system,” says Iryna Zenyuk, director of the National Fuel Cell Research Center at the University of California, Irvine. “They’re massive. They’re inefficient and require a lot of energy input, so even if they just save energy efficiency, that’s already a big step.”
Hertha’s approach focuses on what it can fix about the steel industry now, as opposed to waiti