Houston — ArcelorMittal Brazil has extended the stoppage of its Tubarao's Blast Furnace No. 2 to the end of the year, from an initially expected 70-day time frame, top company executive said .
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Baptista did not disclose the exactly when operations will resume or the reasons behind the decision.
The steelmaker idled the 1.5 million mt/year crude steel capacity flast furnace on June 23, "due to market conditions," the company said in a statement in early July.
The maintenance stop, originally slated for mid-August, was first set to follow its original 70-day time frame, now delayed until the end of 2019.
ArcelorMittal Tubarao, located in Vitoria, produced around 7 million mt of crude steel in 2018, down from 7.2 million in 2017. Its plant is focused on flat steel products.
Last year, the unit exported a total of 2.37 million mt of slab, according to customs data, which is close to its surplus production of slab of around 3 million mt/year.
The temporary halt of the BF was cited by market sources as a result of the exhaustion of permitted semi-finished steel export quotas to the US, coupled with a sluggish domestic market.
PROJECTS ON HOLD
The steelmaker has three ongoing projects in the region, two of which are currently on hold: a Juiz de Fora a melt shop expansion of 200,000 mt/year, and in Monlevade a sinter plant of 2.3 million mt/year, blast furnace expansion of 1.2 million mt and a melt shop.
Proceeding at ArcelorMittal Vega unit in Brazil is the company's expansion project with a forecast completion in 2021. It is aimed at increasing hot-dip galvanized sheet and cold-rolled coil capacity and includes building a new 700,000 mt/year continuous annealing line and a continuous galvanizing line.
-- Jose Guerra, jose.guerra@spglobal.com
-- Edited by Derek Sands, newsdesk@spglobal.com