Indian steel producer Tata Steel may have to shut down one of its two blast furnaces at Port Talbot plant in the UK unless government support for decarbonizing the country’s steel industry is announced by July, according to media reports. The company needs to decide whether to extend the blast furnace’s life, shut it down or replace it with an electric arc furnace depending on what the government decides.
A permanent closure of the blast furnace could result in thousands of job losses and further damage to the UK steel industry.
In December last year, Tata Steel UK, subsidiary of Tata Steel, had announced a program of improvements at blast furnaces that will reduce the Port Talbot plant’s annual carbon footprint by about 160,000 mt of carbon, as SteelOrbis previously reported.
The two blast furnaces at Port Talbot plant annually produce around 3.6 million mt of liquid steel.
