POSCO announced that FINEX plant commenced production

POSCO announced that FINEX plant commenced production

South Korean steelmaker POSCO completed the construction of its FINEX plant which started in January 2001 with an investment spending of Won 157.7 billion ($ 130.8 million) and launched production on May 29, 2003. This new plant, with an annual capacity of 600'000tons, is using an environmentally friendly ironmaking technology called FINEX process which is a project related to the Carbon Disclosure Project conducted for the purpose to reduce greenhouse gasses. It is expected that right after the complete verification of the new plant's operations this process will be commercialized within two years. The FINEX process which has been developed by POSCO in cooperation with Voest Alpine of Austria since 1992, will reduce production costs by 15% compared to the current blast furnaces due to the traditional ironmaking technologies they are using. This advanced process enables to use cheaper and well-supplied iron ore powder and non-coking coal directly. POSCO stated that the annual capacity will be gradually increased up to 1.5 million tons and small and medium sized blast furnaces at the Pohang Works will be replaced.