Steel Mills

USS's Mon Valley No. 3 BF Could Stay Idled Through November

Written by David Schollaert

September 22, 2022

US Steel Corp.’s month-long maintenance outage on the No. 3 blast furnace at Mon Valley Works near Pittsburgh is expected to be completed on Saturday, Sept. 24, a company spokeswoman confirmed to SMU.

US SteelOnce complete, the blast furnace is expected to remain idle for the next month or so in response to declining demand and market conditions, sources familiar with the matter told SMU.

When asked for comment on the potential idling, US Steel said that “market conditions will dictate if it is restarted.”

The blast furnace was taken offline on Aug. 30—pulled forward by more than a month—for shotcrete (sprayed concrete) reline and maintenance, a significantly shorter and less expensive process than a full reline.

Mon Valley Works has two blast furnaces: No. 1 and No. 3. The No. 1 furnace has a daily ironmaking capacity of approximately 3,200 tons. The No. 3 furnace has a daily capacity of approximately 2,900 tons.

The furnaces are located at US Steel’s Edgar Thomson plant in Braddock, Pa. That facility makes slabs and rails them to the company’s Irvin Plant in West Mifflin, Pa., where they are rolled into sheet.

If the latest idling stands true, this would be the third in a series of idlings this month, following the temporary idling of the No. 5 tin line and the No. 8 blast furnace at Gary Works in Indiana.

The Pittsburgh-based steelmaker has said weaker demand and increased imports were to blame for the two temporary idlings.

The potential idling of No. 3 at Mon Valley Works comes on the back of lower third-quarter earnings guidance—down nearly 50% sequentially and 60% year-on-year—while negotiations for a new labor contract between the steelmaker and the United Steelworkers union seem to be at an impasse, according to a Sept. 16 USW bargaining update.

By David Schollaert, David@SteelMarketUpdate.com

 

David Schollaert

David Schollaert is a senior analyst for Steel Market Update. David joined SMU after more than a decade in the metals and mining industry in a myriad of different roles. Much of his early experience and expertise were within the coverage and analysis of steel-making raw materials and served previously as senior editor of the CRU Prices Service. Most recently, however, before his return to market analysis, David held roles as a metals buyer and an operations manager for raw material suppliers. Based in CRU’s Pittsburgh office, David can be reached at david@steelmarketupdate.com or 724-720-1008.

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