One of the largest Russian pipe producers ChTPZ Group plans in 2010 to commission a new mini-mill at its subsidiary Pervouralsky Novotrubny Works, thereby allowing the company to achieve vertical integration in the seamless pipe segment, making it almost self-sufficient in billets for seamless pipe production.
Accordingly, the first steel smelting at PNTZ's new electro-smelting facility is planned for the first half of 2010. This will be followed by half a year of hot testing, after which the facility is to start operating at its full production capacity, i.e., 950,000 mt of steel from scrap metal per year.
The construction of the new mini-mill, which has cost a total of $500 million, was started in April 2007 and was originally scheduled to be commissioned in the first quarter of 2009. The contracts for the supply of the main mill's equipment, including an electric arc furnace and two continuous billet casters, were concluded with German plantmaker SMS Demag.