On January 17, local and international media announced that Italian plantmaker Danieli and Ukrainian steelmaker Metinvest Group finally signed an official memorandum of understanding with the support of the Italian government. The companies aim to relaunch the Piombino steelmaking site, as SteelOrbis reported in November. In line with the agreement with the Ukraine-headquartered steel producer, the Italian government has been handling similar negotiations with India-based JSW Group to further expand production in Piombino.
The site with a total investment of €2 billion, will cover an area of 2.6 million square meters, and it will have an annual capacity of almost three million mt of hot rolled coils. The new site will employ about 1,500 people, and, according to Metinvest CEO Yuriy Ryzhenkov, “It will be one of the greenest steel plants in Europe”. Metinvest has been interested in expanding its operations abroad, including production operations, given the significant loss of steel output in Ukraine. The Russian invasion of Ukraine had resulted in the loss of Metinvest’s steelmaking units in Mariupol (Azovstal, Ilyich SW) back in 2022 and in the loss of the Avdeevka coke plant this year.
This agreement in question is also part of the new national steel industry plan in Italy that involves four sites: Taranto, Terni, Piombino and major mills in northern Italy, as SteelOrbis previously reported.