Displaying items by tag: Luxembourg

Luxembourg: Paul Wurth marked its 150th anniversary on 4 November 2020 by expressing its thanks to “Customers and partners for the faith they have placed in us and in our technologies during so many years. From supplying metal structures to local steelmakers at the beginnings to the present transformation of the industry towards decarbonised production processes, the prime objective of our business strategy has always been to listen to our customers and meet their requirements with added-value solutions.”

The group also expressed its hope for a “safe situation and positive mood” in which to connect with customers to “celebrate this important anniversary in a festive way, even with half a year of delay,” in mid-2021.

Luxembourg: ArcelorMittal’s sales fell by 2% year-on-year to US$38.5bn in the first half of 2019 from US$39.2bn in the same period in 2019. Its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) dropped by 43% to US$3.21bn from US$5.59bn. Crude steel production volumes rose by 3% to 47.8Mt from 46.5Mt.

"After a strong 2018, market conditions in the first half of 2019 have been very tough, with the profitability of our steel segments suffering due to lower steel prices combined with higher raw material costs,” said Lakshmi N Mittal, ArcelorMittal’s chairman and chief executive officer (CEO). He added that the company had recued its production capacity in Europe in responses to global overcapacity.

Luxembourg: ArcelorMittal plans to reduce its European steel production levels due to weak market demand and high import levels. It will reduce primary steelmaking production at its facilities in Dunkirk, France and Eisenhüttenstadt, Germany. Reduce primary steelmaking production at its facility in Bremen, Germany in the fourth quarter of 2019, where a planned blast furnace stoppage for repair works will be extended. It will extend the stoppage planned in the fourth quarter of 2019 to repair a blast furnace at its plant in Asturias, Spain.

“This is again a hard decision for us to have taken but given the level of weakness in the market, we feel it is the prudent course of action. This will be a temporary measure that will be reversed when market conditions improve. In the meantime, our employees remain our utmost priority and we are doing everything we can to ensure that the right social measures are in place to support them and their families during this difficult time,” said Geert van Poelvoorde, the chief executive officer (CEO) of ArcelorMittal Europe – Flat Products.

In early May 2019 ArcelorMittal announced its intention to temporarily idle production at its steelmaking facilities in Kraków, Poland and reduce production in Asturias, Spain. The announcement also impacted the planned increase of shipments at ArcelorMittal Italia to a 6Mt/yr run-rate. The planned increase will be slowed down following a decision to optimise cost and quality over volume in the current market environment.

Turkey: Erdemir Group has ordered new INBA slag granulations systems as part of an order for two new blast furnaces (BF) from Luxembourg’s Paul Wurth for its Ereğli and Iskenderun integrated steel plants. At both sites a new furnace will replace an older production unit. The new blast furnaces are scheduled for blow-in in March 2021 and May 2021 respectively. No value for the order has been disclosed.

At Ereğli Erdemir’s new BF2 will have a hearth diameter of 10m, 24 tuyeres and two tapholes. It will produce 5000t/day of hot metal from an inner volume of 2188m³. At Isdemir the new BF1 will be sized at 12.5m in the hearth and 3587m³ of inner volume; it will be fitted with 32 tuyeres and four tapholes and will produce 7900t/day, which further increases the hot metal capacity at this site.

Paul Wurth will execute both projects on an EP basis including the supply of technological key items and related supervision of erection and commissioning. The orders include basic engineering of the blast furnaces with profile, cooling and lining concepts as well as the design of the stockhouses, top gas cleaning plants, slag granulation plants and BF cooling units.

For both furnaces, Paul Wurth will supply Bell Less Top charging systems and bleeder valves, refractories for the hot blast mains and bustle pipes, tuyere stocks with tuyere phenomena detection system (TPDS), technological and critical items for the top gas cleaning plants (consisting of axial cyclones, annular gap scrubbers) as well as for in total three INBA slag granulations systems. Extensive sets of TMT probes and process recorders include, inter alia, 3D TopScanburden surface profile meters and SOMA acoustic top gas temperature measurement. Under the same contracts, TMT will also supply fully hydraulic taphole machinery for equipping all the six tapholes in total.

Europe: AcelorMittal has received approval from the European Commission (EC) for the sale of selected steelmaking assets to Liberty House Group. The divestment includes ArcelorMittal Ostrava in the Czech Republic, ArcelorMittal Galati in Romania, ArcelorMittal Skopje in North Macedonia, ArcelorMittal Piombin in Italy, ArcelorMittal Dudelange in Luxembourg and several finishing lines at ArcelorMittal Liège in Belgium. The assets are part of a divestment package that AcelorMittal agreed with the EC during its merger control investigation into its acquisition of Ilva. The transaction is expected to close before the end of the first half of 2019.