In the Cecil B. DeMille epic movie The Ten Commandments, pharaoh Yul Brynner, weary of the plagues put upon Egypt, counters by telling the Jewish slaves that as punishment they must make their same tally of bricks without straw—in effect, ordering them to do more with less.

With new fuel economy standards and increasing crashworthiness requirements for new vehicles, the North American steel industry is finding itself in a similar situation. Not many in the industry are building steel pyramids, but the industry is facing the conundrum of trying to make vehicles lighter and more crashworthy while at the same time maintaining the highest possible percentage of steel they can in each vehicle.

In today's auto/steel production world, the first commandment might read: "Build the same number of vehicles, if not more, but use more steel and make the cars lighter and more fuel efficient." An impossible task? No more so than making bricks without straw, at least for members of the Auto/Steel Partnership.

The partnership is a combination of steelmakers and automakers working together to use the latest generation of steels in vehicle construction. Among the partnership's goals is finding ways for steelmakers and their customers—automakers and parts fabricators in particular—to work together in vehicle design and construction so that new-generation vehicles can meet stricter government regulations related to fuel economy and crashworthiness.

"We want to see more cars built and, naturally, we want to...