Good morning, everybody, thank you for being here with us. For those who have come in person and online to our CSN day, we would like to thank analysts, investors, bankers, partners for their presence. Of course, thank our group of associates at CSN that are very attentive to the messages that we will be mentioning today. We do have a very intense agenda with strategic topics, and we will, of course, focus our attention on the future in the short, medium and long run, and hold a discussion that tends to differ from the one we usually have in our earnings release calls. We have a group of executive directors that will share the full agenda with me. I would like to begin by giving the floor to the Chairman of the Board of CSN, Mr. Benjamin Steinbruch.
If we could please show this. A good morning to all of you. It is a pleasure to be here once again at the CSN Investor Day. I would like to offer you a very short introduction of what we will be speaking about with the necessary detail, then we will be opening the floor for questions and answers. Initially, I would like to present to you what CSN is nowadays, conceptually, at least. The average net revenue between 2017-2019 is of BRL 22 billion. If we consider the averages from 2020-2022, it represents BRL 42 billion, which represents an expressive growth, an important growth. As part of our projections, we'll continue on unaltered. This means to say that for the biennium 2023-2025, we intend to continue to grow in the company as a whole.
If we analyze our EBITDA and EBITDA margin, we can confirm the averages of 2017-2019 of $6 billion. Between 2020 to 2020, it was of $16 billion. Once again, these figures will continue on between 2023/2025. When it comes to the share of assets, we used to be basically a mining and steel company with a share of 91% in our main activities and only 9% for the rest, which refers to cement, energy, and logistics. At present, we have 68/32% share, and we're going to continue to grow in the businesses that we have. Notwithstanding this, with a higher share of steel or lower share of steel and mining, well, the figures that we have in mind would be a share of 60/40%.
As part of the opportunity to create value for shareholders, and when we speak about competitiveness, resilience, growth, financial discipline, and sector role re-rating, we are working with this verticalization to cut down on costs. Upstream and downstream, we are going to become more vertical. We're going to seek out in-house opportunities to reduce costs through new businesses that are related to us, which means that we're seeking out new 1 billion new businesses, and we will consider the financial market, services, maintenance, adding value to our products. We have already been doing this rather timidly, but we'll begin to become more aggressive.
Which means to say that as part of the internal business potential that we have, because of the size, the diversification, and the growth potential of the businesses that we own, we are going to be creating new businesses within our businesses, enabling us to become ever more efficient in these new businesses we have. CSC that was created with this idea with an invoicing of BRL 500 million-BRL 600 million. The coming year, we hope it will reach BRL 1 billion. I'm counting upon the help of Alberto and all the others involved in this. We're going to make this model a prototype for our new businesses as part of the diversification and by mitigating volatility. Of course, we're going to have a geographical expansion, businesses, products, always thinking about selling that and not selling based on tons.
This will considerably reduce our risk by means of this diversification and taking into account the issue of volatility. When it comes to growth, we have the expansion of mining, the new CSN Energia and CSN Inova. We are going to grow. This is a commitment that we have made. It is part of our origin, part of our DNA. We have a growth contracted with P15 that refers to the expansion of mining. We have a mandatory verticalizing when it comes to quality and added value for our products and working with pellets will be the path to do this, and we're already working on this. We have the consolidation in segments such as cement, where we have countless opportunities before us. Well, before everybody, in truth, and we are going to make the most of that.
We have multiple opportunities when it comes to the domestic market and the foreign market. Speaking about energy, we have the entire world before us when it comes to clean energy, wind energy, solar energy, or in terms of agri-business, all with clean energy, all with an enormous growth potential. Within this, we have already shown, as we did in the second semester, with investments of $5 billion in that segment, creating a new and very important business that will be part of our five core businesses at CSN. We're growing in sectors with higher multiples, as you can see in this policy of having 60% of our business in mining and steel and 40% in energy, finance services, new companies created within the group itself and by adding value to our production as a whole.
This idea of new businesses that will represent BRL 1 billion is what will enable CSN to gain in terms of valuation, in terms of productivity, in terms of competitiveness and cost reduction. Speaking about our businesses going forward, our idea is to become divided in five businesses, and we're doing this in practice. They would be the following: the steel business, where our priority is going international, mining, cement. In mining, we are under a frank expansion with the P15 underway. We're going to increase our quantities twofold in the short term. In cement, we can continue to grow both domestically and internationally. We're seeking this out, and there is also the potential of holding an IPO. We are accruing assets of with a high value that will give thrust to our deleveraging in the company in the short term.
In logistics, the same holds true. We have very significant value in our logistics business, the railroads such as MRS, the port. We truly believe in the potential of this business. We can unharness a great deal of value when it comes to these assets. In energy, where we have multiple valuable assets. We do have the possibility of holding strategic partnerships or perhaps an IPO going forward. We have already transformed energy into a significant business for us, a business with very rapid growth, with an extremely low cost. If we compare the cost of the energy we have presently to leverage our business and to transform this into new businesses, the potential is truly enormous and will allow CSN evermore to stop being a holding and become a company that will have five separate businesses as part of our growth potential and valuation.
The strategic priorities for 2023 in terms of ESG, this is our flagship. At present, as you know, I have four children, three of which work with me. One of my children is in New York. They're all young, highly committed with the idea of ESG, and under the obligation of ensuring that we will have a guideline, a very serious guideline, not only in terms of what we say, but in terms of our practice. This will be our benchmark for the present and for the future as part of internationalization, which has been our priority for quite some time. Unfortunately, we have not been able to do very much. Whenever we decide to go international, an opportunity appears domestically, and we make the most of it as part of our vision of occupying more space within the Brazilian industry.
We truly do respect foreign capital. It is always highly welcome. As a Brazilian company, as a group of Brazilian entrepreneurs, we are under the obligation of managing large Brazilian companies with Brazilian capital and participating in the Brazilian market. Although the conditions tend to be unequal, as Brazilian entrepreneurs, it is our obligation to participate in this market. That is why we have left aside a strategy of internalization that would be more rational as we have better margins abroad than here, but we are penalized by the fact that we live in Brazil. We are penalized by the lack of stability, the lack of reliability, and the difficulty in predicting businesses and assets in Brazil. We're highly committed with innovation, with investments in solutions that will lead to immediate impacts.
We are going to create new businesses within our businesses in that quest for productivity and efficiency using technology. Austerity, which is of course very important, our CapEx, our working capital, the interest rates. We are committed to maintaining BRL 10 billion-BRL 15 billion in cash. This is something that we will not relinquish at any moment. We will have that warranty of having BRL 10 billion-BRL 15 billion in cash. Our long-term financing has become a priority as we made mistakes in the past. We wanted to make the most of opportunities at the time, and sometimes we used our working capital rather abruptly.
The P15, for example, nowadays already has guaranteed funding of $1.4 billion in the Japanese Development Bank base, and it is based on this criteria that we will make our future investments, accept the opportunities that come about, but always respecting the need of having long-term financing to be able to deal with these investments. Now, the new investments that will be made outside of mining in cement, for example, because of geographic reasons, will enable us to explore opportunities in incentivized areas, enabling us to have a greater ease in terms of capital and interest rates compatible with our market. When it comes to the low leverage, which is another commitment that we have made, not only is ESG one of our commitments, deleveraging is another important one, and the payout of dividends.
This is a new commitment that we're putting in place this year. These are issues perhaps that may seem incompatible, low leverage, responsible policies, and an aggressive payout of dividends, where people will think, "How do you manage this?" These are three things that compete among themselves. It will be a reflection of 2022. What we are doing in 2022 will become the future model for the company in future years, maintaining a low leverage, having responsible growth and an aggressive dividend policy, under the shelter of ESG and CSN Inova, which refers to state-of-the-art technology. Going forward, you can expect a bit more of what we delivered in 2022, a new CSN. Here a very special message to all of the young people working in the company. We want you. We need you.
We want to have a young, streamlined, and aggressive company with a great deal of diversity, one that will generate multiple opportunities in a rational way and with a very bright future. The future belongs to us. We worked very arduously in the last few years to have the company that we want, a company that nowadays is modern, a company with truly incredible potential because of its businesses, a company that is deleveraged, stands on its own feet and with very clear opportunities that can be explored.
A company with huge commitment to the standards that we the banners that we hold up and things that seem incompatible to us, something that has been applied within the company that will continue to be applied within the company. This is the path we plan to follow. Thank you.
Good morning, everyone. It's a pleasure to be here bringing a bit more detail about our ESG journey for the third consecutive year. I'll be showing you some of the results for 2022 and how our company is structuring itself to meet this agenda, which, as was said, is critical to our growth agenda. I'll start by reminding you of our 12 fold foundation, the most significant topics for the company. They are listed according to their importance, defined according to our framework.
Innovation is the cross-cutting principle. Throughout the presentation, you will see the icon of CSN Inova, whether because of what's been done so far or the projects that are underway. This slide is only to show you that these are the topics that are guiding our way and the way through which the company is going to follow, and these are the ones I'll be addressing during my presentation. I'd be remiss if I didn't start by talking about climate change, our number one material element. We were the first steel company in Brazil to introduce targets for greenhouse gas emission reductions with targets for its other segments as well. We have the target of being carbon neutral by 2050. This is the horizon we're aiming toward. This is the path our initiatives will follow.
We want to come to 2050 being able to deliver on this commitment. This is why we restructured our climate strategy, dividing that into three main pillars. One relating to our engagement with our stakeholders and how we report our initiatives to you via GRI integrated reports and GHG and also via strategic partnerships with other players. That will allow us to understand how this is being done around the world and how we can integrate the best practices because we believe this is an integrated agenda. Another pillar that really holds our ESG standards, we need standards for reporting that will also allow us to have a profound impact on wherever our biggest challenges are, and that's what we have done. We have set our targets. We have built a curve.
We've mapped out hundreds of plans in this area. They have been mapped out according to their maturity. We also need to manage and internalize the risks relating to climate change. We have sought for these risks and opportunities offered in a world of climate change. We've analyzed a scenario where we quantify and monetize these risks. That all of this can be the foundation of our decisions moving forward into the future with the company. Talking a little bit about our decarbonization journey in the steel segment, we have the target of reducing by 20% our emissions through 2035. We have divided that roadmap into stages that we named in colors Blue, Olive, and Green. During the Blue stage, we have many initiatives that have been done so far, some of which has been done in 2022.
We have reformed our coking batteries, so investments in operational efficiency. We've already pushed forward some of the initiatives with the technology in our high furnace technologies, and Felipe will be talking a little bit more about that in his presentation. This is a technology that we used in cement that accounted for 7% reduction in our emissions that will be tested in steel. This is unprecedented for any steel company in the world, something CSN Inova is bringing that will be introduced in the Presidente Vargas plant. I have to talk about the 5 million tons of steel that were produced with a factor of 7.21, considered green steel. This is something CSN is doing today.
As our president said, we are looking into possibilities to expand into Europe, even expanding or increasing this plant, which will allow us to produce more steel with a lower emission factor. A few projects on the pipeline for next year, we'll have a PCI coal, a few projects conducted by CSN Inova. We have a work group to discuss the capture and use of carbon. We think that's important both on the cement industry and in the steel industry. Next year, we will also start the Salina project in Paraná, where we will use green hydrogen to replace natural gas. That's also a project my friend Felipe will be addressing during his presentation. In mining, we also have the target of reaching 2035 with a 30% reduction in our emissions.
We have that mapped out in some of our projects where, if not stability, a slight increase in our projects until some of our structural projects would start. The change in our fleet for electrical cars, which we did this year. We are the first steel company to work electrical trucks, which are being tested now in Casa de Pedra. The engagement pillar also enabled a partnership with Shell. In 2023, we will be testing a synthetic fuel called HVO that can be used in regular combustion engines, but which do not emit any CO2. We'll be able to test both technologies and measure their efficiency. Another very important project that's going online, and we also have green pellets by cold pressing. Another very important issue in our Scope 3 and also very important for the Scope 1 in steel.
Within the context of Scope 3, we should also highlight the entry into operations of P15. P15 is now producing high-quality steel, which is essential to our decarbonization route for our worldwide plant, plants, which is also strategic to this agenda. In cement decarbonization, another thing that's become even more relevant because the cement industry now accounts for 45% of the CSN Group's emissions. This is even more important to our decarbonization issue. We may have one of the most efficient set of plants from this perspective, and I can say without a question that we will be one of the three most efficient companies in terms of emissions per square meter of cement. For Lafarge, we predict a decrease by about 5% in our emissions, which will allow us to have these targets aligned to the international standards.
By next year, 40% of our targets will be aligned to science-based targets. As you know, high coke processing index, the use of tailings and biomass, again, via innovation projects or artificial intelligence, which we have been introducing. Going into water, another very critical topic for our company, considering the large amounts of water we use. It's interesting to see how the circulation indexes are going up and the amount or the volume of water that's been captured has been declining. The difference of our use in 2019 to what we had in 2022, the decrease would be able to supply two entire cities for a year. The amount of water that's being recirculated within the Presidente Vargas plant would be enough to supply the entire city of Rio de Janeiro for a year.
Very high figures, and it's not coincidentally that we were the first steel company to have a water footprint. We ran that study this year, and we will run the same study at CSN Cimentos, where you measure all the losses and use of water at every point in production and compare that with the basin where it is located and the risk that has been put, because we are always looking for maximizing our opportunities. Another material fact, this year we ran a diagnosis of the areas that we have, which are protected.
We put up an impact matrix with ecosystemic services, using our services, understanding how much we rely on those services for each of our operations, that will be packaged for next year and we will begin to import from this new framework, which is TNFD, a cousin of TNFD, but now mentioning diversity and nature. Our dams management, another important theme for the company. It's important to say that the decharacterization of these dams also are also very important. We are turning tailings into products, but the message here for these dams and the structures that we already have, we have decharacterized two of them. The... One of them has already been concluded and the other three will have their decharacterization schedule concluded by 2028. Only Casa de Pedra will remain.
Even though there is no legal mandate to decharacterize it is already in our pipeline. We have already started to hire the engineering study to have the channel around Casa de Pedra. That's the first step in the decharacterization of that dam. It's important to say we had all licenses renewed and the level of emergency is zero. We have a robust management system. We adhere to the best practices in auditing, in technology. Most importantly, we have a zero accident track record in these tailings dams. On the issue of security, operational security, the second issue in our materiality matrix. One of the most important aspects for the company, even more so than climate change. In our matrix it comes as the second topic, but it is still a value, a core value for the company.
That's why we are glad to present our first figures since we began to monitor our records since 2014, with a decrease by 24% in the number of accidents with or without casualties. Since last year alone, we had a decrease by nearly 5%. That's 81% of the target we had set for 2030. We have been with Cimentos, with no fatalities, all because of the engagement of our leadership, our people, but also a result of investment in training, technology, and the use of many virtual reality resources. All of that combined brought these positive results for the company. I'd be remiss not to mention our social pillar. Maybe it would take an entire presentation to talk about the CSN Foundation. Just some details about what the foundation has been doing.
It's been working for several years in the areas where CSN operates. It is in 32 cities across Brazil, having invested BRL 200 million in projects that have changed the lives of a number of youth projects in education and culture, sports, music. It would take me a long time to bring all those details about the Foundation. If you're interested, please go to our website for the Foundation. This is a work that the Foundation has been doing for over 60 years, and I chose to highlight two major projects. The citizenship youth. Many of the people that we have in the company, of the youth in the company have been mentored and 82 have been taken in as young apprentices. Another project I wanted to highlight, one has been conducted by the CSC cell of CSN Inova.
It was based on the theory of change, which is what will guide us in the development of the locations where CSN operates beyond what the Foundation does, beyond our operations. What's the calling for those locations, and how can we help them develop, both as we operate there and after we leave? This is one project that is already underway. The theory is already standing, and it's guiding four other projects within the Group. We are becoming increasingly more inclusive. When we set this target back in 2020, we had only 14% of women within the CSN Group. Today, we are 21% of the staff. It's 5,000 women. Now, I am glad to be one of them. We are 5,000 today, and we should be many more by the time we reach this target. It's very, very important.
It's part of our DNA. Our CEO has said that, and I would like to repeat that we want the company to be more and more diverse. We have also increased the number of people of color in the company. We are 21% black, four of which are in leadership. Diversity is not just about hiring new people. Within the company, we need the right climate. We need to train people. We need to understand and teach our staff how to treat people and be inclusive. Not only that, we also have the corporate university, a project that came from our ESG committee, with five main schools that brought training sessions, racial literacy, a platform that reaches every collaborator with the company for continuing education to change these people's lives through education.
We're talking about virtual training, in-person training, all free of charge to all our employees and available for them at all times. We believe in a diverse governance. Our committee is operating in two different directions. It connects our material topics to the administrative board and connects the administrative board to our targets. We have 17 ex-executives from the company with 25 other ambassadors coordinating all of these 8 theme-based groups for those 12 material topics that I showed you at the beginning of the presentation. 67 initiatives have been mapped out in water efficiency and emissions reduction and other risks in our matrix for our new partners and suppliers in ESG. The corporate university, as I said before.
Last week, during the ESG week, which is a week that we have to address the ESG pillars within the company, we had a Shark Tank within CSN. Any person could present their project within the 4 topics that we have listed in connection with the company's environmental actions. These projects have been developed and presented, 115 of them, with 12 finalists, with a panel, with several executives choosing all of those projects. They were so good that we decided to put all 12 into operation. Just to give you an idea about how much that should pervade the entire company. My last slide, I think this reflects all that I said at the beginning of the presentation. We still have a long road ahead of us, but it is clear how much headway we've made.
Every company has a different methodology, and you may be good at some things and bad at others, but regardless of that, we have made progress in each of these aspects. This shows not only that we're doing more, but that we've been able to show a little bit better what we already did. This is not about inventing the wheel. It's about being able to show our practices. With that, I conclude my presentation and turn over to Felipe. Thank you.
Well, good morning, everybody. My name is Felipe Spiri. I have been at CSN for 12 years. This is the first year that I am able to present CSN Inova to you, and I have worked in strategic planning, project assessment, and M&As. The idea is to convey to you some of the updates and the highlights of CSN Inova for 2022. Well, the first highlight refers to the pillars that we have set forth. We decided on the format of these pillars so that it could become an innovation platform within CSN. These four pillars use different tools to foster innovation in the group and the execution of projects.
We mentioned several initiatives, and I would like to go in greater detail on these initiatives, but the focus is the execution of projects to deliver innovation through technologies or other sorts of innovation, trying to resolve strategic challenges in the short, medium, and long term. The way that each of these pillars operates can be found in our site. We now launch the site of CSN Inova in 2022, and you can also speak to our team, which is very interesting. When we began Inova in 2009, there were two people working to create a bridge with the startups. Presently, we have 22 associates working on these innovation projects. I spoke about the solution of strategic challenges, but none of this is possible without an innovation project. These are some of the tools that we use. Our criteria here is to prioritize.
We do receive differential projects, each with strategic challenges. We do take into account the criteria that you will see here to the left. The first criteria refers to operational and financial indicators. We never initiate a project without having full knowledge about these indicators. First, to be able to prioritize, to assess the economic impact within CSN and not only in one of our businesses. The third reason, to become aware of these indicators is to assess the technology that we have brought into the unit, how the indicator performed in the past and the present day performance of the indicator. To the right, you will see the strategic challenges and of course, these are several initiatives and challenges that are underway. For each of the challenges, we do have a number of initiatives that we have included.
The first, of course, is the reduction of fossil fuel consumption, all associated to the decarbonization journey, and I will comment on some of these initiatives. When it comes to these initiatives in the year 2022, we have 55 initiatives underway, distributed through all of our business units, all the way from the corporate to other levels. The great highlight for 2022 is that we now have implementation in scale. We have 11 initiatives that are underway, pilot initiatives and other initiatives that are underway. What does this mean? At a certain stage, we are going to resolve that challenge that we're attempting to resolve through these initiatives. We follow up on them through 12 months, working on a managerial report of the changes that these initiatives have led to.
We already have BRL 100 million in terms of optimization when it comes to cost, organizational efficiency or the productivity of machines, which brings in additional revenue sources. To speak in greater detail of the initiatives for 2022, I would like to speak about the first spin-off of CSN Inova, Circula. We work in full synergy. This was one of the first challenges that we carried out. We went through the entire process that I have just described to you in 2020. The special area went into contact with CSN Inova, and we chose an area to carry out the commercialization of residues at CSN. This area presently invoices BRL 350 million by trading these residues that can now be used. In 2020-2021, we decided to test this value that we had offered to CSN and other companies.
We work in companies with segments very similar to CSN. We raised a hypothesis. We approved the spin-off of Circula Mais. We have this brand with dedicated people working full time to develop the technology and the business. For the end of the year, we already have more than five active clients in the CSN group in large segments of the economy and a prospective portfolio of 25 additional clients for the coming year. Here we have some initiatives. I won't go through all of them. Helena spoke about the green hydrogen injection in our generators. This target is fully associated to decarbonization. Once we can use hydrogen in the generators, we can increase the average temperature of the air for the high furnace. This will increase the temperature of the blast furnace and will enhance our coke rate.
This is associated to a reduction in CO2 and a reduction in the coke of third parties. Once again, this is still in a pilot stage and will continue in 2023. The third project refers to an initiative to reduce the sinter feed moisture. We have a very specific characteristic to reduce the moisture of porous material. We already have this in the sinter feed at Casa de Pedra. We have observed some gains. We have had a reduction in logistic cost. We reduced the moisture of the material transported. We have a reduction in sea and railroad transportation. We have also been able to identify other sites where we can use this technology in the CSN Group. We see other groups working with porous material in steel and cement and well, where moisture tends to have a negative impact.
That is why we're sharing this strategy with other units. For 2023, we will continue on with the focus of decarbonization, working hand in hand with the sustain available team and the new business team. We do have a very favorable environment to test the green hydrogen technology. The reason for this is the matrix of renewable energy that we have recently built. Secondly, we have two startups in CSN that have very promising technologies that refer to the use of green hydrogen. This should allow us to have a very competitive cost to produce this fuel. We have a highly diverse industrial park with several lines of equipment where we can test the use of the hydrogen as a replacement, full replacement for fossil fuels or to replace other fuels.
We're going to assess replacing 100% of natural gas in the lines of Paraná. The consumption would be 28 mega, which means that we are now in this project in its engineering phase. We're assessing all of the necessary adaptations and the technologies that we will require to implement green hydrogen in Paraná, and the same holds for storage at Moinho Verde, where we're also carrying out this assessment. Helena spoke about the Cold project, which is strategic for mining and steel, and will help us in the pellet project. Now, this will enable us not to emit carbonic gas by replacing the natural gas. We have already mapped out this technology. We're carrying out adaptation still at a pilot phase in the laboratory for the pellet feed at Casa de Pedra.
We're working with the teams from Casa de Pedra and steel to validate the use of this. We will continue on with a scale-up of implementation. I would like to go through another tool that we have at CSN Inova, our fund one. We ended the year with several investments. We announced them at the end of the day yesterday. These investments have allowed us to win an award for the year 2023, and we will participate in the book of the CBC with other companies. The success of this fund has fostered the discussion of the creation of a second fund that will have a higher volume of resources. This has not been defined so far, but we will be using the same verticals in this fund. You can see them below.
They are based on the strategic challenges that we have mapped out in our innovation project. The main advantage for fund two is that it will have a more active participation in CSN Inova Ventures. We're going to seek out startups with more mature technologies to be able to adopt their technologies in-house with the fastest pace possible. To end my presentation, I would like to show you the present-day portfolio of CSN Ventures. The highlight is that most of these startups are already operating within the CSN group. Several of them have been operating in the steel group. We have a technology to optimize the variability in processes. We can foresee that this will be used in several of our groups in the steel industry, as well as in our equipment. Cements and mining will also profit from these technologies.
Here we have two companies working with Green Hydrogen H2Pro and another one called First Energy. They are still not in full operation. H2Pro has a technology of electrolyzers with high efficiency. First Energy works with membranes used in this electrolyzer, and they can be used in our process. This is what I wanted to share with you today. Thank you very much for your attention. It is a pleasure to be able to meet you today.
Hey, good morning to all of you. I would like to refer to the steel business. As Benjamin mentioned, we have 3 large topics to consider. The operational excellence, which is, of course, of prime importance for us. I will share some projects in this. Value generation that I mention every time that we are able to converse together.
The issue of internationalization, which is becoming extremely expressive this year when it comes to the results of CSN. We believe that beginning in 2023, we will be able to capture additional projects. To attempt to summarize three years in a single slide and to already speak about the outlook for the steel market in 2023, you will be able to see the turbulence that we had since 2019. If we look at the United States, the average BQ was $200 and some dollars. We reached a peak of 2,100 in July of 2021. Throughout the 2021, 2022 cycle, the price was $260, a very relevant price. Beginning in March, all of you were able to follow up what happened with the international market. There was a decrease.
Luckily enough, in the last 20, 30 days, we are already observing a general increase in all of the markets. This holds true for the United States, for Europe. I was there yesterday speaking to the people in our units in Portugal and Germany, we are able to see an enormous will and the need to recover margins in the steel sector throughout the world. To the left, I think that it will become very clear what happens in the United States. Somebody asked me if I was enthusiastic about the coming year. I always have great enthusiasm. We look at the 6 years since 2015 that tended to be ever more difficult. 2021 ended up being a spectacular year. 2022 will also be fantastic.
In 2023, despite some economic and political uncertainties, I don't believe that the beginning of the year will go askew. We're quite enthusiastic. In a sector where we are positioned strategically. Such as that of civil construction, we should have interesting growth. To go back to the United States, all of the markets are still very stable with an important figure that is important and that refers to chips. This problem is being resolved worldwide, and this includes Brazil. All of the sectors are referring to growth and the infrastructure plan continues to move forward strongly. Our price projection for July of 2023 is to reach values of $800-$820. This is a projection of CRO. We do believe that this will materialize.
Now, if we go to the right, which is the other extreme of the market, China, you are aware of what happened between two, 2019 and 2020. The average was $480 per ton. We reached a peak of $970 and a positive cycle between 2021, 2022 of $800, a drop, and China reached a floor of $513. Presently, we stand at $585, which is the present day price. If we look at the Chinese scenario in terms of margins in the steel plants, in the last 20 years, there have never been that many steel plants with losses in China. There is that will to recover the results and the margins. This has become necessary and there is no other exit vis-à-vis what happens in the world regarding raw material.
Of course, despite the stabilization in coke and carbon as well as other products. This is what we are expecting for the global market in 2023. The first half a recovery and a price recovery at the end of the year. Brazil, despite some uncertainties, some of the sectors will continue on, and I'm much more optimistic than other people who say that the year could end up being a disaster.
On the topic of price, just to give you an idea, I'll dive in straight to Brazil. Today, in China, prices are going to $585, $575. On the left-hand side, we saw the situation of a premium that's around 11%. You have the dollar prices and the premiums that we had about 10 days ago. This is moving. To celebrate the improvement in the market worldwide, we are bumping up our prices from January 1st, and there's no negotiation there. On January 1st, we're increasing by 10% to at least be able to maintain this 12% premium, because we've had premium rates that were much higher. During our breakfast, we were talking about the premiums of 2004, 2005 with 35% of our EBITDA.
We came close to that in 2021, we cannot remain where we are right now. At the peak of our cycle, we had a historical margin of $500 EBITDA per ton. It's steadier now about $300 or $250. I believe that this is a standard that will be sustainable for the industry to be able to run its day-to-day operations and also invest and progress. This is the scenario that we see moving forward, and I'd say it's a given for the first quarter of next year. When it comes to price shifts, following and essentially copying what's being done overseas, there's no reason why it should be different than the rest of the world. It may take a little while, but we will get there.
This is where the entire world is heading toward, which is also good for the business. In terms of prospects for the Brazilian market in 2023, once again, if you look at challenging years that we faced, except for 2015, where it was just under 10, the apparent consumption of steel in the domestic market was at around 10. It peaked in 2021 at 15 and in 2022. If we have a 2023 like we had 2022, that's great. We're talking about a 14 million apparent consumption, which is pretty much balanced from a supply, demand standpoint, looking at the current situation of our plants. Of course, imported raw material is extremely concerning and also what happens here in Brazil in terms of dumping.
Brazil is the only country in the world that has its mouth open to the entire world in a scenario of deglobalization and decarbonization and depopulation. Brazil is even searing away from what's going on in the world. I am not pro lifting trade barriers, but I think that we need a level playing field when it comes to competitiveness. This is also something we are working diligently on and something that we have accomplished as well.
One positive sign that we received from the United States is that in addition to the galvanized product quota that remained unchanged, unlike other countries that essentially increased its Sunset Review issue, Brazil were able to secure another 300 tons of BQ as a quota for the United States. Today we have another 250 of zinc, 600 of cold, which also provides a cushion to any seasonal shift or another challenging time in the domestic market. The situation for long steel is slightly more favorable. The civil construction market in Brazil has proven extremely resilient across the board. Of course, if we look at the downside of everything, we see that there are fewer new projects being launched, but still we have a huge number of projects being launched, both in the residential side and in the commercial side.
This is only just beginning. I think once we have a spark from the regulatory framework and sanitation, privatizations and concessions, once that takes off, I think that we can see a much better situation than what we have currently in Brazil, and we've seen that before. From the industry standpoint, the upside is that I think in the automobile sector, we have already hit rock bottom. The bus and trucks industry was no issue in the last few years. We had even earlier purchases because of what the legislation requires, which is why we expect some deceleration in 2023. In the so-called yellow line of appliances, there's still a question mark, but it declined about 20% this year. Talking about a 4% increase is not far-fetched.
Agricultural machinery has increased, and CSN is closely linked to the construction industry. We can be the best supplier of civil construction plants. We have every type of product that they need, so we can really be their most important supplier of choice for civil construction, which allow us to think about other ways of growing in this sector vis-à-vis our closeness to retail. This is essentially it. Any other industry that saw a hiccup in the last few months, which was the agricultural market, we have no reason to believe that it will not recover. We have the silos issue. There's an issue about renewing fleets, the renewal of the entire transportation part of the industry, so I do not see this as a problem. This will go along with the other industries and will grow in any case.
I talk about this here all the time. I do not wanna repeat myself. Taking back to what Benjamin mentioned, we want to sell steel per kilo and not per ton. We still have a footprint in all the markets running very strongly in a way that allows us to grow rather quickly. It's not that we have a footprint where only have small operations, but we have enough operations in all of these places. Our portfolio of products is very encompassing in all of the sectors we just mentioned. We are even more pulverized in our customer base. We have about 25,000 customers in the group, 8,000-9,000 of them as active monthly customers. We are working on integrated solutions more and more to our customers, more than partnerships.
We have long-term corporate projects in partnership with a number of customers. We are partners of a major distributor in Brazil, which has grown for several years, and today is a nearly BRL 4 billion company, and we will continue to grow verticalizing and horizontalizing our partnerships. We will be a lot more flexible, as Benjamin has already mentioned in this sense. Our integration is essentially what sets us apart and makes us beautiful, so to speak. We are integrating all our assets on the commercial side, on the logistics side. Our structure has a long list of people who are very skilled, and to have those people is what makes the difference, and they are already in several lines of businesses. More and more, we wanna share the know-how across our operations.
As we go into the civil construction, stronger in concrete and rebar, all the accumulated knowledge is absorbed and introduced into the market. As evidence of what I say, I always like to show the figures to support what I'm saying. We continue within our portfolio with 50% of zinc-based steel despite the earthquake that we've lived. Just to give you an idea of all the imports that we get in Brazil, and I'm talking about 1.5 million tons of imported material. 80% of that comes directly from CSN. This is something we have to fight. We'll either remove it or reduce, but there's no way out. We can't let all of this material come into Brazil as easily as it has been in recent times. We are also working in standardizing and increasing quality.
There's a lot of crap coming into Brazil. Sorry for my language, but this needs to be revisited by INMETRO INPI and other agencies. Going back to the chart, 13% of zinc-based, and if you look at CSN is only a plane or steel plates. We also have about 800,000 in Germany for long steel. Also we will account for 20% of the steel industry's EBITDA, just to help you understand our business outside, accounting for 20% of our EBITDA, of the company's EBITDA. This is really strong. We have distinguished products and well-prepared people, and we are growing up there as well.
Going back to segmentation, we do not like to keep all our eggs on the same basket or to rely on companies that require prices with a longer time spent. We were able to grow in civil construction. I think it's still very low. We would like to grow by at least 25% next year. In distribution, we will also grow more in a more pulverized, agile, and closely agile way and closely linked to other chains. I wanna be far away from industries that want to freeze prices. I think this is a dogma that CSN adheres to. We wanna have independence to set our own prices and take care of our own pockets and our own profitability. We do not wanna be subject to crazy long-term contracts that makes no sense.
From the EBITDA standpoint, another important figure, nearly 20% of our EBITDA currently comes from our units overseas. From the standpoint of modernizing our plants, all around, it's about cost and production. As you see, there's no steel plant in the world that is competitive and is not producing its own coke internally. Our own pain point is to rely on outside coking. This is all secured now and starting or by 2026, we should have all our coking batteries ready to produce all the coke we need, and then we will have the autonomy that we need. My dream is to go back to the first quartile with the Russian as we were in 2002.
We were going toe-to-toe to Evraz and so many others, and we wanna go back to that. The focus here is lowering costs and having coking batteries. Now, there are other things such as revamping LTQ 2, other thermal projects that are also important, but this is essentially it. That will allow us to take a leap in production, moving from or moving to about 4.7. We have been very close to that in the past. If you could look in the rearview mirror in a more critical way, you'll see that that has happened before. The progress that we will see in cost will be the same of the same magnitude that we will have in the production of coke. This is a very clear illustration of what's being done.
This year we have $50 million EBITDA that was a result of the investment in coking batteries. There are other projects that we have in the plate projects connected to thermal efficiency, and this is moving fast. I think the way we've been doing it and for our company, CBSI, working closely to us, we can maybe have this cycle being completed a year, a year and a half earlier than expected. This is also critical to us. What's already secured about this? The expansion of our capacity to produce metal sheets. Our quota today is ridiculous of 13 tons a year. We are working to take this quota to at least 3 times higher in Washington to go back to at least 150,000 tons.
The United States purchases about half the metal sheets in the world. I have a very significant prospect for us here. This goes to a very high standard quality here, expanding the capacity for pre-painted as well. This line has already been purchased. It was operating. It's nine. It's state-of-the-art. In 14 months, it will be ready here in Brazil, ready for assembly and commissioning. We have 2025 on the slide. Today we had a meeting with our suppliers in Europe, so this should be brought back to the first quarter of 2024. With that, we will have the output of 112,000 more in pre-painted. This also takes us another step forward in our chain.
Lastly, this is something that's under review, even though we have site location, engineering project, basic project, and detailed project. We have a dream and the purpose of having another plant in the United States. The best way we can think about it is to have a mini mill to supply the civil construction market, to be able to capture and make the most of the civil construction boom in the United States that should last for about five years. Lastly, showing you what really happened, there's no questioning facts and figures. Our sales volume for the last few years. Our net revenue, which is very much steady despite the challenges we've had this year. It's at around BRL 31 billion. Our EBITDA, which peaked at BRL 33 billion, but with the cost reductions in plates that much of which has already been captured.
After some adjustments in price that are now necessary, we expect to go back to about 25%, which is not very far from where we are today, so it's not that difficult to do. A peak in tons, which was close to 500, is now at around 340. Slightly more difficult at the beginning of the year, but with the rise in prices and lowering in costs, that will be solved. This was essentially the goal, and we are showing you precisely the main points for CSN: operational e-excellence, value generation and internationalization, and also what we have been able to accomplish so far. You can expect good news. Thank you, and have a great day.
Good morning, everybody. I'm going to have a very brief presentation. I do not have slides. I would simply like to underscore some very important areas for us. I would like to begin by thanking all of you for your presence at CSN day. This motivates us a great deal. I have my entire team of directors who will be at your entire disposal to answer your questions. I would like to state that I am feeling quite optimistic, very positive. The year 2022 was positive for CSN. Why? It was a year in which we surpassed problems, resilience in a very rapid change of scenarios and a great deal of rainfall. We were attempting to implement our projects, and we wanted to put them all in place.
We had the war in Ukraine, an energy crisis, the pressure of inflation and an increase in interest rates, a crisis in the real estate market, the COVID crisis, a slowdown of economy, and the rupture of the supply chains, COVID and the war. Why has it ended up being a positive year? We hit rock bottom in the last semester in 2021, but in 2022, we will have a very positive close, and we will enter positively into 2023. All of the projects that I mentioned are fully operational and are offering us very positive results. In CSN, we have four pillars, which is value creation in the short term. First of all, the discipline when it comes to allocating capital.
All of this begins with our day-to-day management, maximizing the use of resources we have available, and we can explore this further. We are going to begin in the movements of the mine, and we have had a significant gain in productivity. How did we achieve this? With leadership, with a focus on what we can control. Of course, being very disciplined in terms of cost, a focus on clients and all of our workers have been fully trained to produce with efficiency and high productivity. We will continue on with this in 2023. We're quite austere when it comes to implementing projects, quality, terms and budget. Our second pillar refers to ESG. We are a benchmark in the segment in which we work. We are fully independent of trends, and this is very important.
In energy, we are self-sufficient with renewable sources. We work with full inclusion. We have several women in our operation. If you look at Casa de Pedra, we are a benchmark in this segment. The third pillar is innovation, with a focus on decarbonizing by electrifying the mining operations, as mentioned by Helena. We have two electrical vehicles. We're using synthetic zinc, and all of our construction equipment is operational. So this has been our focus, decarbonizing. The fourth pillar, which once again is important, CSN is one of the few mining companies with the qualifications to create products that comply with the standards for decarbonization. This, of course, is very important. We have a pellet feed with a reduction of decarbonization, which will be very important in the future.
This will enable us to have greater diversification in the market and diversify our markets going to the Middle East. To conclude, I would like to invite you to visit us at Casa de Pedra to see all of these activities for yourself. Thank you very much. Good morning. I'm going to continue on with our vision of the iron market for the coming year. We believe that the market will be balanced with a growth of 200,000 tons with 2 million in China due to two factors: a gradual recovery of the real estate market and a more flexible attitude towards COVID that has already begun. In Asia, we had a slight recovery of our industrial area, and in Europe, still under the impact of the war with Russia and Ukraine.
Now, iron ore should contribute with a higher increase the coming year, recovering the significant losses impacted by the rainfall in 2022. In Australia and Canada, the ramp-up of some projects, and of course, we will benefit from the import rates that were improved in November of this year. In this scenario, we believe the prices will fall between $100-$110. The future curve is already reflecting. This is between those two values. We are working with this scenario as part of our planning for 2023. Sea freight with a significant reduction for our costs in China. The change of the carbon route, prioritizing other markets, will allow us to work with the Atlantic route for iron ore. This, of course, is interesting, and this has already materialized.
For the coming year, we will have 1.6 million tons at $17.8. The forecast is to have this average price for the coming year. When it comes to quality, as you know, this is one of our main mantras at CSN. We're going to have a standard center of feed, very similar to 2022. We had a problem with the ramp-up in some of our projects, this is part of the past. We're foresee a growth of 6 million tons for production at our main plant, and this will enable us to significantly enhance our quality. We will be reducing the cost because of the reduction of contaminant by $4 per ton.
In the average term, of course, we will benefit from the ramp-up of all of the phase one projects with the introduction of the direct reduction pellet feed and the blast furnace pellet feed. When it comes to our reviewed schedule, we're focusing on the reduction of risks, always trying to maximize project returns. This risk reduction will be attained thanks to the advances in engineering in our products. The engineering advancement has led us to review our schedules beginning now. A higher CapEx because of the inflationary pressure that we have felt. Despite this, all of the projects continue to be very resilient with a break-even below $50. A very sound project that will enable us to give return to our shareholders. When it comes to Pires, the review is from 3 to 1.5 million tons. Exactly in that quest for maximization.
The best, capital return was based on this. Now, the return here is minor. There are minor volumes, and with this change, we're able to operate the plant for eight years instead of four, and we will have a better utilization of the installed capacity because of the advance in mining. In P4P, a change of location that will enable us to share the infrastructure of the loading terminal at Pires. In P5, another learning that we have from the ramp-up of projects, we analyzed the project and have decided to postpone it to carry out jointly with the conversion of the central plant, because of the advances in engineering. There's the discussion of operating the plant, and to operate it jointly with itabirite that will only take place in phase two.
In B4 and CDP, the priority of the company, of course, is the decharacterization of the dams, and this is already part of the schedule that you will see in the next slide. When it comes to the ultra-thin, this is a project that we have great confidence in. The basic engineering has been concluded, and this will validate the strategy that we have set forth. This is the new curve that shows you the update of our project schedule. We will be entering the 1st quarter of 2024. In 2025, we have an additional two projects, CDP and B4 . B4 and CDP coming into 2026 up to 2028. This schedule has an updated CapEx of BRL 3.5 billion.
If we go more in depth in P15, we have reviewed the project once again with Hatch, which is a top engineering company. They have assessed our schedule and CapEx, increasing the security that we have in executing this project, which will be very important for the company. We're thinking of strategic security when it comes to the mine. We have concluded the conceptual part of engineering and are working in the more detailed engineering at a level of 63%. We already had some deliveries in the fourth quarter of this year. Now the physical advance of the project is doing quite well. The next stages of contracting will be for the infrastructure package and the equipment package, and we're expecting to sign the contracts for this in the first semester of the coming year.
Here you see what has already been done for this plant and a three-dimensional view of this project. Helena and Enéas spoke about the P15 project, which is highly strategic to reduce the GHG gases. CSN Mining has been acknowledged as being a potential leader in this field. We will be able to increase our production of direct reduction pellet feed, and we will also work with higher premiums because of this, because demand is very strong. We have carried out some journeys and have advanced conversations when it comes to moving forward in these partnerships to produce green steel with a significant reduction in terms of CSN Mining, which means we're moving ahead in terms of Scope 3 and moving ahead in terms of pellets. Here, the CFR China costs, we're expecting a significant drop down to 2023.
All of this aided and abetted by a drop in the freight cost of $6, which we have already mentioned. This will be offset with an increase in production that should reach 15%, a reduction of DMTs, increasing the production and efficiency of our team in the front line, and an increase in the size of the fleet for the transportation of waste handling. We have already had a cost reduction in the second half of this year. The acquisition of a renewable energy generation asset will result in a cost reduction of 0.4 per ton beginning in January of 2023. Although the close of this was carried out this year, this was not reflected in the coming year. Of course we will benefit with a reduction in the cost of energy.
Regarding the production volumes, the guidance is of 34 million for this year. What we expect for 2023 is to overcome the non-recurring events that we faced in 2022. First, we had the ramp up of the central plant projects. This ramp up ended up moving ahead slower than what we had expected, with an impact of 4 million tons this year. We are now running our operation at full speed, and this will enable us to have a substantial increase in volume. We also hope to have a more normal climatic effect. We're not expecting the rainfalls that we faced at the beginning of 2022, and once again in April, with a relevant impact on our operations. We have a more aggressive strategy for the purchase of iron ore from third parties. The procurement last year was 8.8 million.
We should deliver something close to 9 million, and we foresee a greater increase in 2023, perhaps reaching 10.5 million tons. To go back to a critical point, besides the increase in purchases or procurement this year, we sell somewhat more than we have bought, and in January, we will benefit from a higher inventory. Besides selling off what we produce, we're going to reduce our inventory by at least 2 million tons. We're referring to a range of production and purchases of 40.1 million, and we're going to be delivering 40.1 million-43 million tons in 2023, which represents a leap of 23% in our sales, an expressive increase in volume.
We also spoke about a quality enhancement from the central plant, a reduction of $4 in terms of contaminants, a reduction in the freight cost, and stability with a reduction of CO2. This year we're going to be operating in the middle of the range at $20-$22. In the third quarter we delivered a CO of $23, and the cost of production at the port should also be below what we had in 2022. The annualized results that you see for the last 12 months of $5.1 million with a margin of 45%, we truly believe that we will be delivering substantially better results despite the drop in Platts year-over-year.
I would like to conclude by highlighting our very aggressive dividends policy since the IPO in February of 2021, when we captured $3 million in the primary IPO. We have already paid out BRL 7.5 billion. We're among the five largest companies in the Brazilian stock market doing this. Of course, this will enable us to continue to generate significant cash and have a very solid capital structure, working with an aggressive payout of dividends and maintaining our growth and capacity. This policy of dividend distribution will remain between 80% and 100% of net income. This is funding for long-term growth, enabling us to be very competitive. We have an LOI signed with JBIC and NEXI, Japanese institutions for $1.4 billion to support the growth in the plans of JBIC .
Thank you very much, and we're at your entire disposal for questions and answers. Remember.
Good morning, everyone. I'd like to talk a little bit about cement here at CSN. I'm really happy because the company has been able to have huge transformation in the cement market, bearing in mind that in August 2021, a year and a half ago, we had two cement plants that were really competitive, but whose production capacity was lower than 5 million tons. With the recent acquisitions of Elizabeth and LafargeHolcim, we now have 13 cement plants with a production capacity after the elimination of a few bottlenecks of 17 million tons. We have more than tripled CSN Cement's capacity. We have potential to grow even more.
As you'll see in a few minutes, we have synergies that make us really happy when we look at LafargeHolcim and Elizabeth's possibilities with an avenue for growth that's even longer. A year and a half ago, we went from the sixth player in the cement industry in Brazil to become the second largest cement producer, which is something that makes us really happy, the entire team, the entire CSN subsidiary that's working toward that. I will be talking a little bit about the market. We'll introduce this new cement company and go over some of the synergies that we have already identified and are working to realize, and also the avenue that we see to capture or to realize new synergies.
About the market, Martinez touched on this, especially when he talked about long steel, giving us an overview of the market. We are feeling positive about the market, as always. We see civil construction as a resilient industry and the number of new properties being launched at a very high level with a few adjustments left and right. The level of savings for housing also at a significant level for the last five years, also with some fluctuation as well. These two fundamentals in combination provide us an assurance for continuity of the cement market in a resilient way.
In addition to that, the new government, the government elect, is also talking about a significant focus in investment in programs such as My House My Life , with a new set of industries with BRL 40 million to invest in infrastructure with both private and public funds. Bear in mind that the latest bids that were launched by this market created an opportunity for investment of about nearly BRL 200 billion over the next five years. We see that these fundamentals in combination are very important to support the growth in cement. In 2022, cement sales in Brazil have declined by just over 2%. Despite all the fluctuation, but looking forward, we are optimistic about recovery in this market, expecting sustainable growth over the course of the next several years. We should also point out the capacity utilization in manufacturing.
The cement industry in Brazil, we have to remember that over 50% of its capacity is rather old, 50-60 years old, to be precise. With the rise that we've seen in demand, this is an industry that will increasingly work with a lower capacity utilization. That, combined with the fact that cement prices haven't gone up as high as inflation, we see very significant signs that we'll be able to continue to move our price points upward in the next few months. With resilient demand, maybe with some fluctuation, we expect growth over the next few years and a price recovery trend that's expected to continue. Bearing in mind that cement prices in Brazil are the lowest in the world.
If we compare the price of cement that's around $50-$60, in similar countries or more developed economies, we are talking about $120 per ton. We're very optimistic about this recovery in prices that we expect to continue. About the new company. We are the second-largest cement producer in Brazil with 17 million tons of cement a year. We have highly mature projects that I will be talking about later on, which over time, as necessary and in keeping with the demand requirements, these projects will take us to about 25 million tons. We have seven plants, six distribution centers, or 15 actually, distribution centers.
One thing that we are always glad to remember is that when we purchased the assets of LafargeHolcim in Brazil, we inherited businesses that were in places where we did not operate. The aggregates and concrete, and also a franchise of retail stores to sell cement. These are businesses we are studying very closely so that we can grow them over the course of the next several months. What is it that makes this cement platform so competitive, which is considered the most competitive platform in the industry? First of all, the integration of LafargeHolcim and Elizabeth provides a very significant avenue for synergies, which I'll be talking about later on. The decarbonization process is very advanced.
We have a lot of co-processing and cement, which reduce the emissions of CO2 per ton of cement and also makes us competitive in terms of cost. We have traditional brands in major markets. We now have a nationwide footprint with a presence all across the country, a diversified portfolio, and also diversified distribution channels. In addition to the opportunity to be able to grow with these mature projects that I'll be talking about, not only in cement, but in cement aggregates, which is another business that we inherited, as well as concrete. To give you an overview of how large CSN Cement now is, if we consider the pro forma result for 2022 full year for the LafargeHolcim's assets, we're talking about BRL 1.2 billion EBITDA.
Considering all the synergies that we have already identified and are now in the process of realizing, we should go up to BRL 1.8 billion when talking about EBITDA. These synergies that we now envision are even stronger synergies than we had initially expected when we had the valuation of LafargeHolcim. We are now 30%-40% larger than we initially projected. The main drivers of these synergies are electrical power. A few acquisitions that CSN had in that market makes us 100% autonomous in energy with green energy, and with that, we use the benefits of high production and therefore lower power rates. We have several sustainability and operational efficiency projects that were developed to reduce the bottlenecks in our operations, improve our energy efficiency with many coprocessing projects to improve our operational results at large.
In logistics, we have a huge source of synergy gains, both because of the pricing strategy that we have within the company today and also for the assets that we have recently acquired and for the way we serve the market. I mean, what plants provide cement for what markets. Optimizing the way we serve the market, reducing our logistics costs significantly. Also importantly, logistics in the supply process. We become a very significant company in the industry, and the company's procurement purchases are internalized with a significant improvement there as well. Another important thing I'd like to highlight is the assets we've recently received, combined with the assets we already had, allow us to say that we have now a stronger team or the strongest team of people that are staying in the industry.
The focus in realizing these synergies is a challenge for execution. We are highly focused, very energized. A lot of people are involved, all of them working internally to realize and implement those synergies. A little bit about our footprint. In essence, we now gain relevance in some of the most important markets in Brazil with a capacity share of nearly 20%, 37% in the Southeast, bearing in mind that the Southeast accounts for 45%-50% of the country's overall demand. CSN Cimentos is a leader in this market. We also have a major share in Northeast Brazil as well as North, and at this point, smaller in the South, but we are trying to grow in these markets as well.
In addition to the synergies I've already shown of the about BRL 600 million that we are already realizing and implementing, we are already envisioning a number of opportunities about which I will briefly talk right now. Still in the topic of decarbonization, we have a platform called Geocycle that was inherited from LafargeHolcim, which is a very efficient platform to acquire and allocate tailings in our plants to replace fossil fuel for renewable fuel. This is a platform which alone, at this point, generates about BRL 150 million in EBITDA, going up to BRL 200 million in the next few years with the projects that we will implement. Right now we have over nine projects to increment the use of alternative fuels. Another opportunity is the use of cement with an important share in two very significant markets.
Another avenue that we are now starting on and plan to dive very deep into is the commercial optimization. We now have a new customer base, customers that grew with these new assets by 43%. We are operating in every channel. Originally, CSN Cimentos was highly focused on bagged cement. Now, with Lafarge, LafargeHolcim, we also have a significant share in bulk cement. As was said before, we prefer to sell by kilo as opposed to by ton, and the pulverization is CSN's core strategy. We will continue to try to work on selling bagged cement, seizing the opportunities that we have in the technical segment as well. Another opportunity, another synergy that is not yet included in the figures that I showed you, is the integration that we will have downstream.
We are studying the concrete and aggregates business which are new for CSN, and we see the opportunity to grow, even to leverage the growth in cement. We have projects of low CapEx with small reductions in bottlenecks that will increase our production from 3 to 6 million tons in aggregates. Now in concrete, where we have only a small share and want to grow that share, we plan to grow via small acquisitions over time, and we want to be one of the three main players in the industry. In addition to that, the Disensa network, which is the retail network that we mentioned, is a business we are beginning to know a little bit better is an opportunity for us to better position ourselves in the retail segment.
No less important, let's talk about the avenues for growth in the company. While we are a benchmark in terms of consolidation in the cement industry in Brazil, because of our short history, we are always paying attention to M&A opportunities that make sense to the company. There's also an avenue for organic growth that's well established with projects that are already significantly mature at this point. With large and high level results, reserves, with a number of projects, or of machinery that's been produced in Brazil, we have the opportunity to grow the cement operations in Brazil in three main branches. We have the opportunities in the northeast to expand our operations and also in the south, where our share is low at this point.
These are projects that absolutely complement our current footprint, projects that could take us to 25 million tons. As we work to mature for these projects to mature via studies to optimize our CapEx and environmental licensing, we are waiting for the right time when it will make sense for the company in terms of growth within the market to introduce these new projects. Just a quick overview of our most important cement indicators. Here we have a pro forma overlook as if LH's assets had been implemented throughout the entire year. We are talking about a production volume of over 12 million tons, a BRL 1.2 billion EBITDA. This doesn't include the BRL 0.6 million that I mentioned.
In combination with the synergies that we have already incorporated into our business plans, we're talking about a BRL 1.8 billion EBITDA, a margin that's increasing back to over 30%. These were the comments I had. Now I'll turn over to Marcelo, and if you have any question, feel free to ask them.
Here I am back to end the presentation to speak about the other businesses, and we will conclude with our financial figures. I would like to begin with energy that has a, well, something separate for it. It has become a new business, a platform for growth, and we're going to review the strategy and what has been done in the last few months. The strategy of the investment of BRL 4 billion in a sector which was not a sector for which CSN was known. We have four different reasons, basically because it represents a very good return. It's a company generating high cash and to invest on returns 20% above inflation, pointed to an upside potential. This is what we found with Quebra-Queixo and with CEEE especially. The second reason was the competitiveness of our main products, steel, cement and iron ore.
Energy, of course, is a highly important input. We went through this in Europe. We now observe it in the United States. To be self-sufficient enables us to forecast the cost, the cost that will stand out. You will see the cost in tons for each of these commodities, and this is very important. The third reason is that makes us fully autonomous in terms of renewable green energy, wind power, solar power, and others do not have this. As a group, we have invested in sectors that imminently invest the risk of increasing cash and that have a foreseeable cash flow in the future. This, of course, makes the difference. These are the four reasons why we took this important step, and this is a portrait of what has been done in only six months.
We begin with some legacy assets from privatization, our cogeneration with CTR in UPV. We already had an installed capacity of 700 MW. We have increased this capacity threefold. We began with the PCHs of Sacre and Santa Ana that were purchased from Brookfield for BRL 770 million. Quebra-Queixo, another BRL 850 million, an addition of CTH that came along with the assets of LafargeHolcim and the significant acquisition of the state energy company, the CEEE-G, and this is how it will continue to be called. We haven't stopped there. We have ambitious projects in-house, where we're going to increase wind and solar generation, reaching 3.5 GW. This will be our footprint, and we will show you this in greater detail.
We're practically with a footprint in all of the regions of Brazil with our water assets, a potential of 3.4 GW. We're also speaking of 21 energy projects, a significant photovoltaic solar plant, all with renewable energy. I think it is worthwhile speaking more about this project, which so far is quite unknown. The photovoltaic plant in Floriano. It arose on the land of CSN, and it was acquired because of the synergy with the bed where the Transnordestina Railroad will be going through. This, of course, is geared towards logging, but the potential is very important. It has the best solar energy in that location. It is close to the transmission auctions. As part of this vocation, we deemed it advisable to carry out a survey. We have requested the graph.
We are entitled to incentivized energy. This project will bring about 1.2 or 1.3 gigas of installed capacity with an average capacity. This will enable us to trade with energy, which is something that we do not necessarily have to be on our own. We have invested billions of reais with excellent returns, and we can work in partnerships, and this includes partnerships and investment. This will be developed in the next three years. What is it that this new asset portfolio will bring to us? Of course, it will enable us to reduce the cost of power based on contracts that formerly were quite steep, and they had significant charges. With 516 megas, we will have 215 megas of our consumption that was based on long-term contracts.
Some of these contracts are expiring now. In 2023, they will be completely replaced by our autonomous energy. There is this benefit in production. We're showing you the magnitude of this 50% reduction in the cost of energy, reduction in transmission costs, a reduction in the charges that will also be reduced. This doesn't depend on execution or any execution risk. This is something regulatory. It will enable us to have a surplus of 200 megas for the coming years. It offers us a sales and purchase platform for energy that will bring about an immediate return that we will begin to see as of now. For those who are outside of CSN, we will now be able to quantify what this new business represents as CSN. We have moved very rapidly on this. The structure, of course, is not necessarily simple.
Part will be in the businesses of steel, mining, and cement. Of course, we will work with what CEEE is trading, and this will bring other results. When we bring together the contributions, this is the order of magnitude, more than BRL 500 million when we move away from the expensive energy and produce our own energy. In steel, BRL 18 million. In cement, where the largest part can be found, it's an energy-intensive business, and the assets of CSN Cement had very expensive contracts. We're now plugging in this lower cost renewable energy, so the most significant step has been in cement. With the incorporation of Quebra-Queixo, the cost of production of iron ore will add up to BRL 80 million. The surplus energy, the 200 megas, will also be sold.
With conservative calculations, we will have a gain, a significant gain, gains inside our business and within the energy plant. We show you how we're going to account for this. We're going to go beyond BRL 358 million once this energy has been fully traded at these new values. Half of this energy will be sold out to CSN. Of course, once we report results, there will be a segregation, and we will see these results in the energy business unit. This was the main message that we wanted to convey in terms of energy, but of course, we're missing a very important pillar that we refer to little and that can unleash a great deal of value. I'm referring to logistics that works with companies of the magnitude of MRS, that will represent more than BRL 3 billion in the coming years.
There is a concession that has just been renewed until 2026, we own 38% of that company. This company is worth more than BRL 20 billion in terms of equity. The share that CSN has in this company is worth BRL 8 billion-BRL 10 billion. Clearly, this is very difficult to valuate for investors, we need to unleash this value, show the capacity of MRS once it grows. It's not only a cost center transporting iron ore. It brings together different areas in Brazil. It can take part in new railroad concessions, to unleash the value at MRS will become our short-term goal. Another project that we refer to as a downside is the Transnordestina. We have two good pieces of news, a new mesh network, a very ambitious project of bringing together the hinterlands of Piauí with the port of Suape.
Of course, this includes heavy engineering work and significant financial investments. The regulatory issue is about to be resolved, and we will be able to advance with our works, and in three or four years, we will have our railroad operational, transporting iron ore, agricultural products, in a region where there is a great deal of held-back demand. Transnordestina has had recent advances, thanks to the agreements that allowed for the return of public financing for this project and a new amendment for the concession that simplifies the trajectory and of course, reduces the CapEx considerably, enhancing the feasibility of this project. This is something that will be concluded with significant speed beginning the coming year. It will be become a cost center once we unleash its value. We're speaking of Tecon. It brings together important capitals in the northeast that are serviced with highway transportation.
Now, to invest in the streamlining of the mesh, we have been able to grow and have increased results twofold year after year. This will be the only railway that will be used in the Northeast and will stop being a challenge and will become a significant asset. When we speak about Tecon is much larger than simply a container terminal. It generates BRL 100 million in EBITDA and is highly strategic for CSN because this is where we export our added-value goods. We're going to speak to Sunset Review in the U.S., increase our exports of VQs. It has the enormous potential of being a multimodal logistics terminal. We have had an increase in general cargo. We have become a logistics operator, and we can work with lubricants and other by-products, of course.
We have some work to do inside, but we will transform the potential of this port. It will receive the same attention that we gave recently to energy and cement. It will allow us to take a significant leap with this port once again. To conclude, to consolidate all of these projects, of course, we have to focus on our EBITDA. That has had a astounding behavior. We have increased it fivefold in the last five years. We went from a peak of BRL 22 million to BRL 14.4 million in the last 12 months. The question that remains is: Which is the future of this cash generation? What will happen once the EBITDA at CSN becomes normalized? We have some cards up our sleeves.
Of course, the prices of iron ore and cement will change vis-a-vis 2022, we have the operational enhancement in mining, bringing us greater volumes with better quality. We have the cement that has taken a leap, as well as energy with the acquisitions that we have carried out. With this, we're not taking any step backwards. The trend is to grow. We're concluding our budget for 2023, we do believe that 2023 will be better than 2022, with significant cash generation and EBITDA improvement. This is the path that we have followed in terms of our indebtedness with significant drops in 2022. In the last two years, we had BRL 20 billion in cash. This led to the rapid drop of the net indebtedness between 20 20 and 2021. In 2022, we have invested, made capital allocations, and that is why we have this deleveraging.
Our cash generation will, of course, be responsive with all of these assets, with all of the cards that we have up our sleeves. We will continue to reduce this deleveraging. As a goal, we have created this range, which is 1.5 times net debt EBITDA. every once in a while, we will be faced with opportunities that we have to make the most of, as we did with LafargeHolcim and Energy. The leverage can fluctuate up to 2.0 times. We will remain between 1 and 2 times net debt EBITDA. This is a message to analysts and investors. We do have important assets initiatives that can enable us to speed up our leveraging. If the iron ore continues to drop, we're going to carry out an IPO in cements. We're going to bring in more equity.
We have our share in energy. We can bring in investors to help us speed up this deleveraging as well. Multiple alternatives that will guarantee that we will remain within the level of 1 and 2 times net debt EBITDA. The most important message was given by our chairman. We are no longer a player that is seeking growth or seeking opportunities. We have become a player that is quite generous in terms of what it distributes. I think this has become very clear when we look at the years 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023. We have already paid out more than BRL 3 million, a yield of 16%, and we have already announced our expectation of paying out BRL 2.3 million additional until May.
In the second half of the year, if we think of the average payout, we're going to continue having yields above 15%. This is part of our planning. Of course, the cash and the leverage is compatible with this. This will become an additional attraction for our investors. To conclude our discussion on capital allocation, we have the CapEx. Here you see the result of all of the projects that you have seen in our presentations on this CSN Day. The figures, of course, are going to increase because of the expansion project, which is the P15. In 2023, it will require more than BRL 2 billion.
The expansion of mining will require BRL 2 billion-BRL 2.5 billion per year, we're going to invest heavily in the competitiveness of UPV in the coking batteries, the reform, and this represents BRL 5.5 billion-BRL 6.5 billion in terms of capital allocation. With the EBITDAs that we have presented and despite the higher CapEx, we're thinking or speaking of free cash flow yields above 15% in 2023. Even during periods of higher CapEx, these will be double digit until 2025. Cash generation will be able to face the payment of dividends as well as prepare our CapEx. We have been working actively in terms of our debt quality. We have issued only in 2022, BRL 14 million. If we include 2021, we issued BRL 20 billion in new instruments. Are we seeking something that sets us aside, that is very creative?
The incentivized instruments. We have worked with incentivized debentures, CRIs, off-balance instruments, structured energy operations, bridge loans, bonds, institutional or infrastructure debentures. Always trying to lengthen our debt, which has reached seven years of duration. three years ago, it was only three years, and at lower costs. We're not seeking plain vanilla that has a higher cost and that is under stress. We're working with Japanese development banks and working on liability management, especially for our growth projects. There will be funding for growth in Brazil, and this is where we're going to head to become more competitive. Now, what will happen with our indebtedness profile? We're going to move away from our dependence on the banks, the capital markets, balancing our financing in dollars with the local currency. Because of our very diverse profile with cement and mining, we do generate our funds in dollars.
We're going to seek to enhance our rating. Our search continues to be for an investment grade. We're taking considerable steps in this direction. In 2022, we have been observing the environment where our metrics are already for a higher rating than DDD. We want to be D+ very soon. The thing to do is to continue on this trend. What is important here, a track record. During some semesters, we will be upgraded, and we will reach that investment grade very soon. I would like to conclude with this key message. Each business has its challenges and its priorities. We're more optimistic than most when it comes to 2023. Well, there are cloudy skies, but also sunny regions in China and the United States. We will have growth. It's always good to have those cards up our sleeve.
As I mentioned, we are going to grow necessarily because of our acquisitions, because of the increase in the iron ore production, because of our financial austerity and better cost. We will do whatever depends on us. We cannot control the market. That is the reason for our optimism. We can now go on to questions and answers.
Good morning. This is Rafael Marcellus with Santander. First of all, I'd like to thank the entire board of CSN and also the IR team for organizing this event. My first question would be about costs. I would say that one of the main questions from investors today is relating to how the costs have evolved in the entire industry and not only with CSN. If you could add some color about how you see the cost moving forward in the medium to long term, especially in steel. I understand that in mining you have provided a guidance, but I see that most of that decrease come from a change in regular costs. If you could give us some of the prospects.
Also, seeing as we are now in December, if you could talk a little bit about the margins and what we can expect for this fourth quarter and also the first quarter of next year. My second question is about capital allocation and leverage. When we look at how your leverage has evolved, especially from the debt performance perspective, we can say that the company has done a great job in the last few years in that sense. When we look at your cash position currently at BRL 16 billion with a six-year coverage, what could we expect in terms of free cash flow to help us understand, combined with your leverage guidance, considering your M&A and so on? Thank you.
Thank you for your question, Rafael. Starting with our costs in mining, we have some pressure from inflation in a few of our lines. The good news about the fact that MRS's concession has been renovated until 2036. The tariff model gives us a slightly higher tariff next year, so we have some pressure there. We have mentioned energy, which should have a $0.4 per ton. A 15% increase in production next year will really help us in reducing the fixed cost. We have already seen some of that in Q3 because our cost in Q1 was $23.4, and in Q2, $24.3, and Q3, it's gone down to $19.
We expect to maintain that level between 19 and 21, which is a lot when we compare to the rest of the industry in the sense that we are pointing toward control in our crisis and eventually a decline, whereas our competitors are looking at an increase. I would highlight an increase in production, but there are also a lot of elements in terms of increasing our efficiency. We have been able to increase our machinery performance. We have even recently changed our fleet control system, which is now entirely automatic and also provides improvements in the core plant. We should also highlight that
The trucks have been changed from 30 tons to 40 tons, you have the cost of moving and labor. There are a number of measures in terms of internal management that are now bearing fruit, and we have good prospects for next year. Well, on the steel side, we had a very erratic 2022 when it comes to raw material costs, especially coal, coking, and even LNG, which led our steel plate costs to record highs. We had even iron ore going over $200, and even this year, just over $150, and now being normalized. We have some visibility about costs going down in the average year by year, or year-over-year by over 20%. It's important because we know how much prices have gone down.
Considering market prices for the curves in coal and coke, that's what we expect. Combined with a more regular operation with better volumes, month-by-month, helping us to decrease our costs. We're talking about $250,000 per EBITDA to something around 2020 or 2030 in 2023. That's essentially the message we had in terms of costs. Now, about Q4, as you mentioned, we are now moving toward the end of the period, and it was exactly as we expected. Costs have gone down. Also, on the other hand, there was some price correction, so much so that we even expected margins to go up. For the time being, in Q4, they should remain flat as compared to Q3.
As for volumes, we expect to see continuity, so there's some seasonal impact there. Anyway, it will be a positive quarter, and we have some prospect for costs to continue to go down. Even on the price side, with growing volumes, I would say. We will definitely have a Q2 that's better than Q1 and a Q3 that's better than Q2. Still, we would what we expect is an improved results in Q4. Lastly, about the cash flow, those $10 billion-$15 billion is what we had already mentioned, but this is more a consequence of liquidity management. I think that the important thing is leverage. That's our key variable. We expect it to be below 1.5, as we had in the guidance, and in the medium term, going back down to 1x our EBITDA.
Rafael, I just wanted to add from the conceptual perspective, we are now fighting a holy war against cost for quite a while at the company, and this is management's role. We are working diligently to fight or to lower our costs. We started this year, just as we did in March 2020, when prospects weren't positive for the business, and we were ultimately positively surprised. Back then, we prepared the company for war, and we worked diligently in costs. Again, we are doing the same thing, and we hopefully will be surprised by a much better market. We always have to work on costs. It's not just about negotiating raw material. This is something that we do really well, absolutely.
It's also about productivity and about the technology that we are developing across our product lines, also working diligently in improving efficiency. That's the challenge for CSN's management, generally speaking, meaning we work to lower our costs. On the opposite hand, the fact that the price of our product is given by the market, so we do not really have a lot of margin to work outside what the market requires. We believe we are aggressive and distinguished on the sales side. We come from the commercial side, and we try to be the best on the manufacturing and on the financial side. The potential for greater creativity, we find on the commercial side. This is true for all our products and is something that we'll continue to do and more and more so.
Despite significant volumes in all our products, we work as if we were a retail niche. We will be seeking technical alternatives to obtain better prices, both in terms of the aggregate value and in terms of the competition. We're trying to verticalize our chain. If we have to buy a market, we will do so in a smart way. We will create subsidiaries to have our services, in some way, benefit our relationship with customers. In summary, we will turn to all possible variables to ensure the best market price. That's what we want to do. Working in cost is what we have to do, and we will seek for best margins, which is a tradition with CSN.
We have a profitability brand that we conquered over the course of several years, and we plan to maintain it and improve it. As for leverage, I always say that we need something in our pockets, and that's what allows us to survive, and that's what allows us the freedom to decide on medium to long-term policies without forgetting about the very short term. I can say that CSN has easily about BRL 10 million in its pocket to monetize. I don't mean monetize by selling assets, but using financial engineering or selling its equity. We do not plan to sell any of our assets. From the energy perspective, the industry allows us to be creative financially, which is something we will definitely make use of and fit whatever we can in terms of opportunities.
From the cement standpoint, within the proper market and with a perspective of consolidating the industry, at some point, we will also go to the market or to some strategic partner. This is something we'll also resort to, this accumulation of assets, to stick to our commitment toward growth, dividend payouts and low leverage, which is something we didn't do before. Two years ago is when we started that as CSN. We start the year knowing what alternatives we have to adhere to our commitment to the market, which is now a bear market, and to continue growing. Regardless of everything we've done, we are probably one of the five biggest dividend payers in the market. We have paid dividends of 18%, which is crazy.
Our dividend is now at 16%, despite its growth, despite its investment, despite the circumstances, despite our profitability and cash generation, because we believe our business. That's what we'll continue to do. Meaning whatever 2022 was, will be reflected in the years to come. We start our budget with a commitment to cost, to leverage, to growth, and to dividend payouts.
Good afternoon, everyone. Daniel Sasson with Itaú BBA. Thank you for the presentation. My first question is, I think, to Martinez. You mentioned in your presentation a 10% increase in prices starting January 1st. I just wanted to understand how you see the environment in terms of demand and competition to actually be able to affect that increase.
I mean that because in a not so distant past, we saw prices in the domestic market to be even at a discount when demand was not doing that well compared to the international market. It feels like your expectation is not for such a thriving demand in 2023. Martinez, if you could talk about how comfortable you are with the actual increase in prices, that would be great. I think my second question is to Edvaldo. Thank you for sharing with us an update on the synergies that you guys expect to realize. It wasn't really clear, at least to me, and what's the timeline for these nearly $600 million? When do you plan to realize at least the main building blocks of these synergies?
If you could maybe rank what your priorities are in terms of realizing synergies as the most important for Cement, for example, or no, maybe I wanna close the gap that you mentioned of $50-$60 compared to other markets in the region. If maybe you could add $10 to the price, that would be, again, as significant as that of your synergies. I just wanted to understand your priorities and where you've spent or devoted most of your time.
Hi, Daniel. Thank you for your question. Naturally, a price increase is only right when it's consolidated. I must confess that in this second half of the year, we were a lot more aggressive, as I had said in our last conference call, especially in coating products.
In a way, the trade-off between losing volume and losing margin for a highly, value-added product, there's no escape from that. We benefited market penetration, and our imports even came down. I would say that it's on a downward trend now. What we're seeing right now across the globe. Once again, we are not entitled to being different than the rest of the world. In the United States and even in Europe, we have very clear signs of recovery. China especially made me very optimistic because they are really making an effort to recovering the margins in the steel industry. If you have analysts of that market, you can see that really well. Even because iron ore prices have gone up and iron ore prices at 100 and 120 make up very different scenarios.
I'm confident that this will be the case because no one will leave their money on the table unless they're stupid. What happens is, today, we essentially have a premium that if you do not make that correction between your domestic and international price, that will look like 2%-3%, and that's not reasonable. We have traded on a stronger demand with premiums of as high as 20%-25%, which lasted for a while. I'm absolutely confident that a 10%-12% premium with our current demand, which is not that of 15% of 2012, but 13.7%, it seems sustainable.
Naturally, in the manufacturing industry, where we are not the main players, I'm not the main player in the automaker industry, for example, there's a different trend because we saw a period of higher prices for automakers during this correction and distribution and civil construction and other segments of the industry. In our turf, we will introduce that increase, and we have a while to expect the market to absorb that. I have no question that if the market is smart, it will keep up with that.
Hi, Daniel. Thank you for your question. I just wanted to clarify on the price topic that I presented, Martinez, please feel free to add to my answer. We see the fundamentals are ripe for us to continue growing prices.
We see the industry working with an increasingly lower idleness level, a competitive idleness, that's better. Also the fundamentals that we see with the resilience of civil construction, where we expect demand to increase. Considering that environment and also one where prices in Brazil are really low, $50-$60 in Brazil versus $100-$120 in several other countries, we cannot sustain the prices at this level. We look at this recovery with a positive view, but this will take a while to occur. As to the timeline to realize your synergies, we are doing really well. Some synergies are already being realized and should be consolidated over the course of the next few months. Marcelo mentioned the energy side, where from the beginning of January, we will have the benefit of self-production.
There are a number of synergies in terms of operational efficiency improvements that will come with time. Efficiency in our pricing and distribution to markets also coming over time. Of these 600 million, Marcelo mentioned that we are reorganizing our budget, so everything within that budget is being considered for us to realize over the course of next year. There are additional synergies over which we will be working that have not been considered, such as, for example, the growth in concrete and aggregates, where we see a very interesting possibility, is not included in our business plan, but will be very soon because we are studying that in depth. Our priority today, I would say that we are spending a lot of energy on the transition process, but this is good energy.
I mentioned the team that inherited with Elizabeth and Holcim, which is a very competent one, but everyone is very focused on delivering those synergies. These are different cultures, corporate cultures, obviously. Accommodating those cultures and adjusting them so that we have the best of all breeds is what we're doing right now. We are very focused on that. Our energy is fully devoted to this integration process so that no opportunity is left unseized. Okay.
Thank you.
Daniel, a very important point regarding the coverage that you carry out in the cement sector. There are very few people writing reports on this sector. An important part that refers to prices with the acquisition of LafargeHolcim. The cement is directly linked to logistics, of course. Cement is not transported during enormous stretches. You will see how competitive the market, the 6th runner buying the 2nd runner. Overnight, we went to having 15 plants, several distribution centers, not necessarily belonging to Lafarge, but our own distribution centers. What we look at in cement is the net FOB. The fact that it is pulverized, that it is in the retail market, that it is working more with technical cement with Lafarge. Because we have a more efficient logistic, of course, this will reflect in the figures.
If you carry out an evaluation of our peers without trying to see which is the best, we do have the best margin in the sector, vis-à-vis the 3 main competitors in the sector. There is something positive that we're doing when it comes to cost, as well, when it comes to recovering margin. Oftentimes, in cement, this is linked to logistic efficiency and not necessarily to price. As Benjamin mentioned, we're going to test the price until the limit. We're always trying to attain that limit. In the case of cement, because of the market elasticity, we are still in a good place. The industry has lesser capacity than what was presented here. The idle capacity tends to be very expensive, BRL 250,000 per ton of cement, and this will never return to the market.
Of course, we don't have what happened in 2021, where we had an increase of more than 100%. Cement increased the price twofold, the variables and the fundamentals are very positive to allow for this to happen. Thank you for your question.
Good afternoon, from Goldman Sachs, Marcio Farid. I have two questions. The first to Benjamin. You speak a great deal about potential opportunities in North America. You mentioned you would like to have a plant there once again. If Europe draws your attention, as W2 and Portugal as well, with its interesting profitability, we see several steel plants that are stopping there. Would you make the most of opportunities of what is happening in Europe to be able to grow there as well?
The second question, in mining, if I'm not mistaken, Pedro referred to the freight that now stands at $18. You're working with 1.5 million tons. Wouldn't it make sense to lock up greater volumes at those prices? In terms of the CapEx of mining, we have observed a postponement of 12-15 months, which allows us to put in the figures that the new timeline will come into effect in the coming 3-5 years. Thank you.
Thank you for the questions, Marcio. Let's begin with mining. Regarding Alcoa, the windows are open. There's a great deal of fighting in the market to be able to lock up a lower price. We are closing for a vessel that carries out 4 journeys every year. Our contracts will extend throughout the year. They're not concentrated based only on volume.
We're having other conversations to see if any of these will materialize, and we will only close at a price that we deem to be adequate. In terms of CapEx, well, we're looking for something that will bring us security because of the shareholders. We're not going to make a decision simply to comply with our schedules. The schedules are being reviewed. Things will take longer to become mature. The most relevant project, P15, is making significant strides. More than 60% of the engineering has been concluded. It is a reality. This is what brings us comfort. There's a great deal of internal pressure as well because of the engineering and the schedule. Those who make decisions in the company will, of course, execute the projects when they are deemed to be sufficiently mature.
I think we have full alignment in terms of this, and the break even is $50, and we do not foresee prices lower than this in any scenario that we're thinking about. Why not execute our project step by step with the safety that we have to use to proceed with? We have to be careful with the company money. When it comes to the investments abroad, as I mentioned initially, we're doing whatever we can in terms of margin, profitability, and results, of course. When we think about our multiples compared to our competitors, they're less than half. This because of the reliability and the predictability that Brazil no longer offers, and that seems to exist more abroad. The only way of achieving these multiples that we're seeking is having assets abroad, and this has become our greater goal.
In terms of valuation, we are at 4 times, which is what others easily have, and this is the fastest and most efficient way to be able to increase the valuation of the company. We're set on doing this. Above and beyond that, we want to have assets that will allow for a takeover. We want to have part of our intelligence abroad as well. We're looking for this. There are some market prospections that are ongoing. We do believe that this is necessary. We think it is timely, and it is something that we will do. We have a country of choice, which is the United States, because of our closeness, our knowledge, convergence, and ease when it comes to the way of thinking. Now, the assets in the United States are quite expensive.
The multiples tend to be much higher than in Europe. In Europe, there is a greater depreciation at large. We have significant proximity with Germany, and there's the real possibility of doubling the activities that we have in Germany. two or three years ago, we were under pressure to sell Germany for EUR 480 million. This year, the EBITDA loan will be EUR 240 million. For you to understand what a potential is truly like and the market taxes for this, we are able to bear it. I would like for those who were critical at that time to reflect upon this and learn from what was truly done at the time, because this is what it means to be a manager, to be an entrepreneur, to do whatever is necessary to and to base yourself on what anguishes others cannot be justified.
This is something that I would like to underscore at this point, because presently Germany has had excellent performance, and we believe that it has the potential to increase its activities twofold. We will do this. This does not resolve our problem. We need to have many more assets to have this reliability, predictability in our figures, not only for analysts, but for shareholders, for bondholders, and the market at large. So that we can continue on with this aggressive policy for growth, for deleveraging, and the payout of dividends. I think we're going to be quite stubborn when it comes to doing this, but we have to wait for the right moment, for the right opportunity. Strategically, this will become the most important move for the life of CSN as a company.
Rodolfo from JP Morgan, thank you for taking my question.
I have three questions. The first continues on what we were saying about steel. I think it has become very clear for the different businesses, which is the history of each of them. I would like to go more in depth in the discussion in terms of this ambition for internationalization, perhaps a new plant in the United States. What is it that you have seen, which are your assumptions when it comes to return? One of the rationales, of course, would be to have a company re-rating, but I would like to hear your perception in terms of returns. Perhaps I understood this wrongly, but I understood that the path would be to create a greenfield, a mini mill, if acquisitions have been ruled out or if they could take place. In terms of return, what will happen?
What is it that you will decide to do? The second question regarding the infrastructure business, based on the message from Marcelo, I believe that you have addressed two of the five boxes that you had as part of your mission for growth in energy this year, and this is where you have room to improve on further. What are you going to choose to work in-house, to work correctly with the Transnordestina, to make adaptations in Tecon, enabling its growth or, do what you did with energy and cement as well? The last question to Benjamin. Thinking of your future hopes, aspirations. Nowadays, the company is heading towards these five large businesses. It's increasing the size. Is this your vision for the future, to have 5 large businesses, and this will mean that your mission has been complied with?
Is this your vision of the future for the company? Thank you.
Only referring to the financial part, the investments in the United States. We do understand that comparison with projects such as investing in P15, where the re-rating will be very close to 30%. Now, in the case of investing in the United States, this will not happen. We're going to begin with a plant in Kentucky from scratch. Of course, this will represent a different return. We want a return that is adequate vis-à-vis the cost of capital, having financing sources, pro bonds, or the supplier himself. Financing is enabling the average return to be 15%-60% in dollars. This would be attractive, and this would open up avenues for that expansion of our multiples.
It's not more than $350 million with incentivized funding, with that type of return and deleveraged, of course, simply to clarify. The question regarding the infrastructure, would you like to respond to this?
When we speak about infrastructure, because of the different alternatives we have, we look upon this in an opportunistic work. We do have things to do in-house, but we do have that capacity to better look at the sector, bringing in good people, experts who will have their antennas out. Something with the right structure or through partnerships, working with third parties. We're going to speed this up, but we're going to begin looking at what we have in-house. To add to the return on investment abroad. To truly do this, the return of EBITDA should be 15%-20%, 30%-35% in-house.
This is what we're going to seek for to work abroad. The consequence will be the multiples will be something additional. Presently, we're working with a 20% return in the assets or activities that we have abroad. This is our target. Regarding what you have said, our idea is to have listed open companies, independent companies or a CSN holding to migrate everybody downwards, close to our cash generation, separate businesses, each business living in its own world, and above all of this, a holding. This is the future that we're aiming at. What's going to happen below, we know what is going to happen above this at the holding level, I still do not have a clear idea on.
Caio Ribeiro from Bank of America. The first question on your dividend policy and the strategy underlying the return for shareholders.
You pay out 25% of your net profit, but there has been a change in stand regarding this. You have a more robust policy. The graph that you showed us for 2023, the magnitude seems to be very similar to that of 2022. Now, looking forward, do you have a formula that you would like to follow so that we can better understand what you aim at in terms of return for shareholders? Question, if you have any significant retrofit or reform in your blast furnaces? If this is when you would contemplate a possible transition to a mini mill to help you in the decarbonization of your plants?
Regarding the predictability of dividends, of course, this is desirable, but there are very few companies in the sector that have been able to do this consistently. Because of the intense cycles, companies begin in one way.
They then pay out extraordinary dividends based on a minimum rate. I think CSN will follow a very similar path. We will begin with that minimal pulse. See, the deleveraging is the broad target, and we're going to create room. We have so many cards up our sleeves that we're going to try to open up this space so that both of these priorities can move forward hand in hand. We cannot control the timing, so to have a policy at this point seems to be somewhat premature.
You ask about the mini mill. When it comes to our manufacturing strategy, the blast furnace two does have to undergo a mini reform. When we speak about this reform, we're referring to 120, 140, perhaps 180 days, and it has to be done.
When we look at CSN, the beauty of the company is the integration and the link that we have with the blast furnace. Nobody is going to build a new blast furnace. When you speak about mini mills, this is a very controversial issue discussed at length in Brazil. We have learned a great deal from Germany. This is a critical factor for success in business, the way that you are able to obtain the lowest cost raw material, which is scrap. In Germany, for example, besides a recovery of margins and a full use of our product portfolio, we have a very efficient scrap collection hub. This enables us to have a very efficient raw mill. Bringing this model to Brazil would represent great differences. The alternatives for decarbonizing will be elsewhere.
We're not going to change the blast furnace for another source of liquid metal. What I do foresee is that eventually, in some periods, we can complement because of the market opportunities, all of this with the purchase of slabs. The international slab market represents 20 million tons approximately, and there are opportunities in this. There are no import levies, and we could perhaps surf that wave and make some money by purchasing slabs from cheaper sources. mini mills operate well in the United States. 70% are using electric furnaces. To go back to what was mentioned by Benjamin, our project is very positive. We have never left the United States. We continue to sell 250,000 tons per year there. We do have a customer base there. United States is something that we have a good knowledge of.
It wouldn't be a sin to work with a site where we have scrap, the processing contractors and the market there, especially in the South, a region that tends to grow more and making the most of the growth in the United States that will extend for some time. You have to make a bet on this, but to make a bet on the United States at present is easier than to do it elsewhere in the world. In Europe, to my surprise, in the case of Germany, we see how important it is to have operational excellence in the group and to be focused on cost. Cost, cost. The rest we cannot control. I cannot control what the Chinese send to Brazil or their dumping in Portugal.
Luckily, in the Iberian Peninsula, we have Lusosider with 350,000 tons a year. We're quite lucky there. We don't have to do anything. There's a warehouse, there's space for a ready-made line. The only things we would have to do is pay 53 tons per ton, which is what we're paying at present. We're literally chopping our head off. It will become difficult to compete. There's the possibility of working with a better integration. Very broadly, these are the options that we are surveying. The tinfoil, 13,000, the coating or painting line where we can make obsolete what we did today, tomorrow. These are the options that are left. CSN will never close any of its blast furnaces.
We are competitive and will become ever more competitive with respect to the environment, using all of the technology that we have at hand presently and, of course, producing without harming the environment. We are going to undergo the reform of blast furnace 2 the coming year. In 12 months, we're going to have the close of blast furnace. Now, in terms of new investments, an electrical furnace does make sense. We're analyzing this with all the necessary investments that would be required.
Regarding the dividends once again, I would like to say the following. In the 30 years that I have been at CSN, my priority has always been the company in detriment of the shareholders. Well, we took over a company that was almost scrapped in 1973, a small company compared to what we have at present.
We worked arduously to recover and develop the company using its own assets. It's only now that we have begun to do acquisitions, we did grow the company with the assets it had within it. We have attempted to be very conservative in terms of dividends to make this growth possible. We have come to that point in time where we can consider ourselves a wealthy company with poor investors, we want the company to continue to be wealthy, with richer investors. What has changed at CSN is that at the beginning of the year, we try to conceive how to attain growth with the necessary deleveraging and with the payment of dividends. This is what we're going to do from now onwards. As I mentioned, 16% at CSN, 18% at Cemig is a challenge. This is pre-quite difficult.
Our securities abroad are paying 10% or 12% or 8% in dollars, which is a aberration. We're not trying to gain in fixed income, but gain in variable income. We do have that commitment of maintaining the deleveraging. Another commitment is to grow and to pay out dividends in a rational way before the year begins. With our reserve margins, with what we have in our pocket, we're going to draw up what we're going to do in coming years based on those assumptions. An integrated plant like Volta Redonda is unbeatable. We're working with the coking plant. At present, a steel mine without its own coking simply does not exist. We're investing heavily in sintering and the coking plant. Respecting the environmental part, we're going to do whatever we can with technology to decrease our emissions as much as possible.
On the other hand, we're working in terms of environmental conservation, we have the commitment of purchasing areas for preservation and use them as a positive balance of everything that we will do. When it comes to harming the environment, we will always have a positive balance when it comes to the environment.
Thank you for the presentation and all the details. I'm Isabella Vasconcelos from Bradesco Bank. I would like to speak about two topics. You spoke about the evolution for the coming years. Well, we observed if perhaps you will have a significant drop in maintenance in coming years. How can this happen when you're growing based on assets and all of your growth in previous years? If you could give us more color in terms of this.
What is it that you have included in that CapEx for the expansion of the mining port to 60 million tons? If this has already been contemplated in your figures or if there has been a change because of your update in terms of the schedule for your projects and in terms of solar energy, if this is included in the CapEx or not. My second question, the purchase from third parties, Pedro, you remarked that there will be a slight improvement in terms of your purchases from third parties the coming year. Thinking in the longer term, how will you continue to do this? It would be interesting to know about that. Thank you.
Thank you for your question, Isabella. The breakdown is somewhat distorted by the volume of our projects on the steel space. For example, the sustaining project, which before was classified as maintenance and moving forward, it's maintenance only tends to grow, especially via these projects itself. These are somewhat conflated, but there will be no decrease there. About Floriano, the answer is no. We really are thinking about executing the Floriano project under a new regime with money from a new source. Of course, there will be some equity involved, but with incentivized investment, which is why we do not add CapEx to those figures that w e saw.
Thank you for your question, Isabella. About your point about the port, obviously, that's not on the slide, but it is included in the $13.8 billion. I think it's important to make that clear.
Thank you for the opportunity to do that. About purchases from third parties, we had had 8.8. This year, we should have something just under 9.5 with an upward trend. If you annualize even months of heavy rainfall, which are more challenging to receive the material via our terminals, we have been able to deliver 1 million tons a month. If we were to annualize that would be 2 million tons, and we assume this grounded 1.5 figure. We are confident about that because of how we've been able to operate currently. On the other hand, we have local players which were very well capitalized. They had very good results, financial results in the last few years, some of them with very impressive, very bold plans.
We have to wait and see which of these plans will materialize, but I think the result is positive, and there is room to buy a little bit more. Even part of that volume involved in annual contracts. We have a lower spot volume, which makes us more confident in the overall volume for the year.
Thank you. That's clear. Just a follow-up. You keep the perspective on that range moving forward in that curve that you shared?
Yeah. I think this curve includes 10, but maybe there's room to get that extra two. We have to see how the local players will behave in the next two years. There's room for more purchases.
If I may, just another follow-up question about your potential M&A. About potential M&As, if you look at these smaller players, is there room for growth via M&A considering these projects?
Well, we are constantly talking to local players. I think there are very few winning sellers. They like what the industry that they're operating. There are possible transactions, but when you look at the opportunity cost, we have a very good returns with the projects that we are running at this point. We will always have that opportunistic look, and if opportunities come up, we will execute. At this point, there's nothing on the horizon.
Marcelo, before we finish, we have a question from Vanessa Quiroga with Credit Suisse.
These are very quick questions. First of all, for Martinez, if you could please break down some of the main projects that will account for this increase in steel.
We're talking about nearly 700,000 tons of increase expected for 2023. The second question to Edvaldo, if he could please break down a little bit the difference between price and margins, what's from bagged product, and whether it makes sense for us to continue to think about capacity addition in a market where the occupation or the employment rate is not as high at this point?
Well, actually, next year we expect about 4% increase in sales in the domestic market. The most important there is the market share recovery that started last quarter. In Q3, we grew by 20% our sales versus our peers in the market, and they'll continue to grow.
It's about 50% from share, market share recovery, another 60% from tin foil and about 60% from are coming back to the market with zinc products of lower width. That's essentially it. I think Vanessa was looking at page 34, looking at those nearly 700,000 tons comparing to what we produced in 2021 versus what we will produce after those projects. We have a list of projects that will eliminate production bottlenecks, and these projects are expected to be concluded in three to four years. After that, our production capacity is expected to exceed, or expected to have 700,000 tons more. Just to answer Vanessa. I think the other question was to Edvaldo.
Yeah, about prices and margins for bulk product and bagged product. Feel free to add to my answer. Those small batches, small batch sales are what increase the margins for the industry. The thing is, there's been a restructuring in Brazil, the growth in construction, where bulk sales get a larger share and also products that now have a larger share than a bagged product. This can change over time. We have enough portfolio to serve all industries, whether it's bulk sales or bagged product sales. We are very well prepared to serve all of these segments. You asked, if I understood correctly, about the elimination of capacity bottlenecks and the importance of that to moments when there's idleness in the market.
From our standpoint, market idleness is relatively low if we compare that to the actual competitive capacity that the market has. If we compare that to the entire capacity, we may say that we have a 70% capacity use rate, but comparing that to the actual existing competitive capacity, we see the industry operating at over 80%. What we're focused on is preparing all our operations to be very competitive. Our focus at eliminating those bottlenecks is to become more efficient and be poised to grow more in the market and gain market share without destroying our value. That's our purpose.
Adding to that, what I said before is, again, we are not entitled to be different from how the world looks like. It may take a while, but we'll get there.
The concrete segment in the United States accounts for almost 60% of the cement market in the US. Now, what that means is that industrialized construction in the United States is only taking baby steps here in Brazil. Today, concrete accounts for about 25% of cement sales in Brazil, perhaps just over that. What are the overarching trends? A steep increase in industrialized production, both in steel and cement. There's no rebar that's folded on-site. You always put up a structure, and you go to the construction site. That's essentially nonexistent. You take the pieces and just put them up on the site. To grow and become stronger in value generation, there's no way of not looking at gaining share in concrete or other cutting and folding units. That's very important.
As to price, we will be very aggressive here in São Paulo. We wanna come in strongly here in São Paulo, where we still have a low market share. We are taking over the Lafarge unit in Sorocaba, so we wanna cause trouble here in São Paulo. We are connecting the Ribeirão Preto subsidiary, which is a strong one for us, so we will be coming strongly in bagged and bulk product. In the Northeast, we are already market leaders, and we want to perpetuate that in the states of Pernambuco, Paraíba. In Bahia, we are putting up three distribution centers in Simões Filho, Salvador, and Petrolina, and we will also come in strong in that market just to make it clear what our strategy will be.
We also have inherited a strong cement, which is the Cimento Mauá. In Rio, we wanna consolidate our position, maybe widen our margins a little bit, and that's where our strategy comes from, going in retail and making the most of the beauty of the portfolio of our new company, which is technical cement, which is an industry we were out of, which dovetails with the trends in construction in Brazil, which in the next few years will be very close to what we see in the U.S. market. Thank you.
Before we wrap up, first of all, I'd like to thank everyone for joining us, both those who are here on site and those online. If you have more questions, we will be available as usual to answer them.
Now to summarize what this excellent CSN Day was for us, where we had the opportunity to show you what we've done and what we plan to do moving forward, I'd like to say that we plan to work fully in every line. We will be more competitive. We will put up a fight. We want to gain market share. That's what we will do. We will do so in a rational way with more competitiveness and aggressiveness, using all our creativity and financial resources, looking to add value, and certainly ending 2023 with a larger market share than what we have today. From the financial perspective, our priority is to deleverage, to stretch our debt maturity, which is something that we are already doing and plan to continue to do, and the dividend payout, which is now the third factor in our guidance.
From the managerial standpoint, we will rely on our people and increasingly build the skills of the people who are part of our group, who are giving us strength, and as shown many times, will continue to help us move forward. Now, one invitation I have for you is to know in greater depth CSN Inova, because this is a much greater and better company than it seems. We are working diligently and placing it as a priority. These are mostly young people, 22, all of them young, well-educated and determined to help us within this technological revolution we are now living. Also putting ESG principles as a priority. I wanted you to know what it is that we are doing, practicing not only with words, but in numbers as well, because we have a lot to show for it.
Within this policy, we are also diversifying in an effective way. We're doing so because we chose to and not because we are obligated to. We are aware of that. We want every minority to join us and to be highly skilled to do so. We already have a high number of women, which was always welcome and will continue to be. We have women driving 240 ton trucks. We have women across every position. Every minority is welcome. There's a place for everyone with us. We want that collaboration and that support. More importantly, we want to build their skills increasingly more because that's a natural thing for us. It's nothing new.
I always like to remember that back in 1998, when these modern aggressive policies were not in place yet, Marina Silva, who's a woman, came to work with CSN in 1998. She was pregnant with twins, and she joined as CEO in a steel company, which was essentially an army of males, and that didn't really work. I'm talking about 1998. To us, this is really natural, and we are very comfortable practicing, encouraging, welcoming, and wanting this to grow more and more. I'd also like to say that CSN is a lot better and a lot greater than you realize, than you know. Even though we insist on this point, and our past confirms that CSN is a diamond that needs to be lapidated more and more to offer high carat stones in larger quantities.
I'd like to wrap up our CSN day. The ESG thing keeps stuck in our minds, and it has to, otherwise I'll take a beating for it. I'd like to wrap up this CSN day, which for us has been really pleasant. I'd say even surprising for so many positive facts and good news in many areas, as well as fine-tuning and dedication. It may look easy, but yesterday there was a team that was up all night working so that today we were able to put all of this together. I'd also like to thank them. Lastly, I'd like to say that we have exceptional people at CSN in our team. People who are devoted and committed to the company as they've shown many times over.
I'd also like to say that you should all be very proud of CSN because CSN is really proud of you. Thank you.