Japanese steelmaker JFE Steel Corporation has announced that it has restarted the blast furnace No. 4 at its Fukuyama plant. The blast furnace was temporarily shut down at the end of June due to lower demand amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The company had originally planned to resume operations at the blast furnace in the second half of October. The blast furnace has been started a month earlier due to the recovery of demand. The resumption of the blast furnace is not expected to have any impact on the company’s crude steel output forecast of approximately 12 million mt for October-March period, as SteelOrbis understands.
The company has also decided to bring forward the renovation works of its blast furnace in Kurashiki, which were originally planned for 2021.