Steel manufacturers ArcelorMittal, based in Luxembourg City, and Nippon Steel Corp., headquartered in Tokyo, have signed a 50/50 joint-venture agreement to build an electric-arc furnace at their plant, AM/NS Calvert, in Calvert, Ala. The project will cost $775 million and will allow the plant to produce 1.5 million mt of steel slabs, ArcelorMittal says. Construction will begin in 2021 and the company expects the EAF to be operational by the first half of 2023.
The new EAF will provide flexibility to the plant’s slab sourcing and increase its responsiveness to short lead time orders, Brad Davey, CEO of ArcelorMittal North America, says. The plant, which ArcelorMittal and Nippon Steel Corp. bought in 2014, currently is capable of producing 5.3 million tons of flat-rolled carbon steel products annually, ArcelorMittal says. It serves the automotive, construction, pipe and tube, service center, and appliance/HVAC industries, and it currently uses 31.5% recycled steel scrap in its products, according to a company fact sheet.
