To remove fossil fuels from our economy, we will need to find new ways of powering industry to make chemicals, steel, paper, cement and all the essential products our technological society needs.

Most of the energy used in industry is for heating, both for lower temperature processes like drying in paper manufacture and extremely high temperature furnaces used for heating and melting metals. Heat currently comes from burning fossil fuels, but we already have technologies that use electricity to provide heat on an industrial scale.

A form of electric heating already very familiar to us is electric resistance heating, as used in the old-style two bar electric heater or household kettles. Resistance heating involves passing an electric current through a material that has some resistance to electron flow, creating heat within the material. Electric resistance heating is already used in glassmaking furnaces to melt glass at temperatures of 1500°C.

Industrial scale heat pumps move or ‘pump’ heat from a heat source like the ambient air, or use the waste heat from other industrial processes. Because the heat source is free, for every unit of electricity put in to power the heat pump, you get 4 or more units of heat out, making heat pumps many times more efficient than heating by gas.

Industrial heat pumps are used to generate steam which is widely used across industry, in textiles, food making and papermaking. Industrial heat pump systems already operate above 250°C in refineries and chemical plants around the world.

We are familiar with induction hobs that use electromagnetic fields to cook our food. Industrial induction heating can reach temperatures up to 3,000°C. It is often the preferred method of heating metal because it is faster and more efficient than either gas-fired or other electric furnaces. Super-efficient induction furnaces are already used in steel making and in copper and aluminium production.

Electric arc furnaces are replacing the use of coking coal in the steel industry. They can achieve temperatures of 1,800°C to produce recycled steel from steel scrap. Electric arc technology passes an electric current at very high voltage between two electrodes forming an arc. The

electric arc can be applied directly to a target material to melt metals, and in cement production to turn limestone into lime and produce clinker at temperatures of 900°C to 1400°C.

Switching to electric technologies across industries will require capital investment. However, having alternative technologies available means they can be switched in when the natural replacement cycle comes round. Linking industrial sites to their own renewable electricity generation will cut energy costs over the lifetime of the plant.

Electric heat is easier to control than a high-temperature flame, improving product quality. It does not waste heat as combustion processes do, giving greater efficiency. And electrifying industry will reduce noise and particulate pollution, creating better conditions for workers, cleaner air for us all, and take us another step closer to net zero.