Nucor to take planned outage at US DRI plant

US steelmaker Nucor will begin a planned one-week outage at its Louisiana direct-reduced iron (DRI) plant in Louisiana on 7 December.

Nucor said it has secured sufficient DRI supplies ahead of the outage to supply its electric-arc furnace minimills. The US imported an estimated four vessels of DRI from Nucor's other facility in Trinidad and Tobago in November, totaling around 180,000t, according to an Argus analysis of vessel tracking data. The US has imported an average of 107,000 t/month of Trinidad DRI from January-October, according the US Commerce data.

The 2.5mn t/yr Louisiana DRI facility was idled for three weeks in April because of the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic and the market uncertainty brought on by widespread economic shutdowns. The plant was restarted on 25 April.

Nucor's 1.7mn t/yr facility in Trinidad and Tobago was idled from late-March through early-May because of coronavirus restrictions in the country.

By Rye Druzin