EU safeguards on transformer steel split steelmakers and the grid equipment industry

Serguey Asael Shinder15 October 2026, 06:472 min read

IEEE Spectrum reported on 14 October 2026 on a new front in the transformer shortage: grain-oriented electrical steel (GOES), the specialty steel used in most transformer cores, has become a trade dispute inside the EU.

What the Commission did. On 18 September the European Commission unveiled a preliminary package of safeguard measures that raised the minimum prices for imported GOES and for imported transformer cores. The measures are temporary and scheduled to expire in February 2027, by which time the Commission has to decide whether and how to make them permanent. The EU's earlier steel tariffs did not cover GOES, although minimum import prices on electrical steel from certain countries have applied since 2015.

Why steelmakers pushed for it. According to Commission figures cited in the article, EU consumption of GOES rose 32% from 2021 to 2025, yet EU producers' share of the market fell from 66% to 43% as imports more than doubled; more than half of the imports now come from China. Only two EU steelmakers — Thyssenkrupp and Stalprodukt — make GOES at all, and Thyssenkrupp has cut production since December 2025, citing low-priced imports, especially from Asia.

Why the grid industry objects. Equipment makers argue that the problem is supply, not price. Mark Becker-von Bredow of the German electrical industry association ZVEI told the magazine that EU mills today can deliver neither the quantities nor the top-performance grades transformer makers require, adding that imports from partners such as Japan and South Korea will remain indispensable until EU mills can provide those grades at scale. Diederik Peereboom of T&D Europe said the measures will raise transformer production costs in Europe and that nothing in them requires EU producers to expand output or develop the high-permeability grades they do not make today.

The risk they name. ZVEI and others fear the safeguards will either make GOES harder to obtain or push manufacturers to build complete transformers outside Europe and import them. The article notes a parallel in the US, where tariffs on GOES did not cover finished GOES products until August 2025, and transformer cores made with Asian steel were routed through Canada and Mexico.

Source: IEEE Spectrum, "Specialty Steel Squeeze Drives EU Transformer Shortage" — https://spectrum.ieee.org/transformer-shortage-europe-goes-steel