Republic Steel announced that it is positioned to restart its Lorain, Ohio facility, including its idled electric arc furnace, casters and rolling mills, on short notice as a response to the recently announced steel tariff.
Republic Steel currently has open capacity at its Canton melt shop and would restart Lorain which would provide more than a million tons of new production capacity to support the SBQ bar and coil and seamless tube round markets.
The company said that this could result in Republic bringing back 1,000+ jobs to its Lorain, Ohio facility. Republic anticipates that it would take a few months to hire and train employees and restart its idled equipment.
"Republic is more than prepared to support market demand that has been previously supplied by imports" said Jaime Vigil, President and CEO of Republic Steel.