Integrated steelmaker US Steel will restart the last idled blast furnace at its Gary Works steel mill in Indiana on 8 December amid higher demand and increasingly tight supply in the flat-rolled market.
The 1.5mn st/yr No. 4 blast furnace at Gary Works was among those idled in March because of Covid-19-related demand destruction, which caused nearly 19mn st/yr of steel production — much of it in the form of blast furnaces — off line.
In addition to idling the No. 4 blast furnace, US Steel also idled the 1.36mn st/yr Gary Works No. 6 blast furnace and the 1.2mn st/yr No. 8 blast furnace. Both the No. 6 and No. 8 blast furnaces have since restarted, as has blast furnace No. 1 at the company's Mon Valley Works near Pittsburgh.
US Steel will have a single blast furnace remaining off line at its Granite City Works in Illinois. ArcelorMittal also has a blast furnace off line at its Cleveland mill.
Steel demand has remained strong since mid-August, when hot-rolled coil (HRC) pricing hit a yearly low of $450/st ex-works. The Argus US HRC assessment has since increased by 82pc to $820/st.
