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Green Steel for a fossil-free future
Luleå University of Technology
Co-financed by Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth
With funding from the EU

Become a Doctoral student within Green Steel

Apply before 13 November so you too can engage in the Green Steel For a Fossil-free research programme - where your PhD work will also be a contribution to making sustainable industry transformations possible.

Eight opportunities to make sustainablity happen

Eight people have the opportunity to undertake paid PhD studies in the field of sustainable materials engineering.

For the five positions at KTH, apply here  before 13 November.

PhD projects have objectives to shape advanced theory, models and practical knowledge for transforming the Swedish steel industry. The intent is to enable the production of new advanced, materials engineered, products - without the use of fossil fuels - in a way that avoids waste and uses recycled and sustainably sourced material inputs.

Students will participate in a PhD programme that covers the ongoing major advances of scientific knowledge in the field of sustainable materials engineering as well as an innovation journey that involves study visits to industry pilot plants and investment sites. 

Each student will focus on their own specific research project that addresses a particular sustainability challenge. Projects involve theory development that requires a combination of experimental and modelling work.

For experimental work, PhD students will have access to state-of-the-art instrumentation in our laboratories as well as privileged access to large scale synchrotron and neutron research infrastructures around the world. Additionally, in both our campus facilities and via our industrial collaboration, there will be opportunities for students to produce their new material designs and test their new processes in real life.

For theoretical and modelling work, students will have access to computing infrastructures and libraries of databases and computing code.

PhD Project areas

Students will have the opportunity to work with their own research programme within the work packages.

  1. Influence of hydrogen on properties of fossil-free steels
  2. Alloy design for fossil-free steels
  3. Control of the hydrogen content in fossil-free steels
  4. Optimized scrap utilization
  5. Influence of temperature gradients and microstructure on hot-rolled sheet and strip

Supervisors

PhD students will be matched with a supervisor, where the supervisor depends on that student’s specific PhD research project. All supervisors are recognised as leading experts in their speciality – with the department as a whole recognised as a leading research institute globally in the field of sustainable materials engineering applied to the steel industry.

Examples are supervisors and co-supervisors are: Professor Björn Glaser  and Associate Professor Christopher Hulme , Professor Peter Hedström  and Associate Professor Alain Resier, Professor Pär Jönsson , Professor Joakim Odqvist  and Professor Malin Selleby .

Industry collaboration

Both KTH and LTU have extensive collaboration with industrial companies in the mining and steel making industries as well as in manufacturing companies that make extensive use of engineered steel products.

Examples include, but are not limited to; companies such as LKAB, SSAB, Ovako, Höganäs, Scania, H2GreenSteel and Sandvik. PhD students will have the opportunity to participate in study visits to see ongoing sustainable industry transitions.

In the programme Green Steel for a Fossil-free Future, we also have an ongoing dialogue with Jernkontoret - the Swedish iron and steel producers' association.

For further information about facilities you have access to

For experimental and characterisation work, PhD students will have access to the lastest instrumentation and experimental facilities. Examples include:

  • The Hultgren Laboratory  and Lumia  for materials characterisation and imaging at labscale and here  for our leading role in governing large-scale research infrastructures
  • For realistic experiments in energy systems, high energy kinetics, steel flow models and casting and solidification see here  for examples of our various laboratories

Additionally, you will have access to parallel computing facilities and data libraries for computational modelling work.

Relocation support and further information

KTH Relocation  services offer support to people relocating to Stockholm for their PhD studies.