US Steel idles Mon Valley blast furnace

Integrated steelmaker US Steel is indefinitely idling a blast furnace at its Mon Valley Works in Pennsylvania.

The company is keeping its 1.4mn short tons (st)/yr No. 3 blast furnace down after it completed scheduled maintenance to help "balance our production with our order book," a company spokeswoman said.

It is the the company's second idling in less than a month. US Steel on 7 September idled its 1.5mn st/yr No. 8 blast furnace at its Gary Works mill in Indiana.

Combined, the two idled furnaces have an estimated raw steel production capacity of 7,945 st/d. If they were to remain down for the entire fourth quarter, 731,000st of raw steel production would be taken off the market.

Many market participants say the US steel industry is oversupplied at the moment. While US Steel is the only steelmaker to have announced production cuts, steelmaker Nucor expects its third quarter profit to fall along with steel sheet and plate volumes.

By Rye Druzin