Kuwait-based steel producer United Steel Industrial Company (UNISTEEL) has awarded the Italian plantmaker Danieli Group (Danieli) with a supply agreement for delivery of equipment for its new steel smelting facility.
The contract, which is worth KWD 70 million ($255 million) stipulates the delivery of a ladle furnace and a continuous billet caster for billet of 130-150 mm sizes.
The new facility which will be built on an area of 100,000 sq. meters will be completed in 28 months.
In addition, the billets manufactured at the new facility will be used in UNISTEEL's rebar production.
The Kuwaiti local market consumes about one million metric tons of rebar annually, 60 percent of which is supplied by UNISTEEL, 10 percent by other domestic steel producers, while the remaining 30 percent is imported.
UNISTEEL chairman Mr. Awad Al-Khaldi declared that the new facility would help the country to save money spent on importing 600,000 metric tons of billets annually from China, Iran, Turkey and Brazil, and would also limit the impact on the Kuwaiti local market of fluctuations in international rebar prices. Furthermore, with billets being produced domestically, the cost of rebar production will be reduced.