Russia-based Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company (UMMC) has announced that its subsidiary Serov Steel Works will in the first days of September recommission operations at its second blast furnace (BF), which has a capacity of 167,000 mt of pig iron per year.
Accordingly, the restart of its second BF will allow Serov Steel Works to increase is monthly pig iron output to 30,000 metric tons, half of which will be used by the plant for steel production, while the rest will be sold under export contracts and also in the Russian domestic market.
"We intend to increase the share of pig iron and thus decrease the share of scrap in the metal charge used in steel melting. This is because the production costs of pig iron are lower than the current price of scrap. Since the beginning of the year, the scrap price increased by 25 percent, and, according to experts' estimations, will continue to rise," Serov Steel Works' director Alexey Shreider stated.
"Thus, the recommissioning of the second BF will ensure the decrease of production costs for rolled steel products. Steel demand continues to be low, especially in the Russian domestic market, and this is why such issues as optimization and reduction of expenses remain topical for us," Mr. Shreider commented.
In addition, the restart of additional production facilities will allow Serov Steel Works to increase the capacity utilization level of the plant's sintering production, and also to ensure orders for the Bogoslovskoye mine, a Sverdlovsk region-based subsidiary of UMMC, which supplies iron ore to Serov Steel Works.
Currently, Serov Steel Works is operating at 70 percent of its capacity.