On April 19, the Russian steel pipe producer TMK Group (TMK) announced that in the first quarter of this year it registered a 15.4 percent year-on-year increase in its steel pipe shipments to about 1.08 million mt, generally maintaining the record level of production reached in the fourth quarter of last year.
Shipped steel pipe product |
Q1 2011 (x 1,000 mt) |
Q4 2010 (x 1,000 mt) |
Change q-o-q |
Q1 2010 (x 1,000 mt) |
Change y-o-y |
Seamless pipes |
593 |
595 |
- 0.3% |
537 |
10.4% |
Welded pipes |
484 |
514 |
- 5.8% |
396 |
22.2% |
Total pipes |
1,077 |
1,109 |
- 2.9% |
933 |
15.4% |
Including OCTG |
380 |
368 |
3.3% |
363 |
4.7% |
Of the total volume of TMK products shipped, 380,000 metric tons (35.3 percent) were made up of OCTG, and 218,000 metric tons (20.2 percent) of line pipe. Volumes of large diameter pipe shipments remained strong in the first three months of 2011 at 213,000 metric tons, which is 42.6 percent more than in the first three months of 2010.
In the first three months of 2011, TMK shipped about 108,000 premium connections developed by the TMK's Russian (TMK family) and American (ULTRA) divisions, which is 20.6 percent more than in the fourth quarter of 2010.
In the given period, pipe shipments by TMK's North American business TMK IPSCO amounted to 232,000 metric tons, increasing by 9.2 percent quarter on quarter and up 24.1 percent as compared to the first three months of 2010.
TMK expects the North American market for OCTG pipes to remain attractive over the long term, as the increase in complexity of unconventional drilling results in higher consumption of premium pipe products.