US Steel announced Thursday two capital investment projects valued at a total of $277.5 million. The first capital project is the construction of a technologically advanced electric arc furnace (EAF) steelmaking facility at its Fairfield Works in Birmingham, Alabama.
The company will also construct a tubular products coupling facility at Fairfield Works to manufacture couplings with premium, semi-premium and American Petroleum Institute (API) connections for customers in the oil and gas industries, including USS Liberty FJM®, USS-Patriot EBM™ and USS-Patriot TC™ connections.
US Steel has received the necessary authorization and economic incentives from Jefferson County to invest $230 million to construct the EAF at Fairfield Works in place of the facility's existing blast furnace and an additional $47.5 million in the construction of the coupling facility. The construction project will create approximately 650 temporary construction jobs over the course of both projects.
Construction of the EAF will begin in the second quarter of 2015, with construction expected to be complete in the third quarter of 2016. The construction on the coupling facility is also anticipated to begin in the second quarter of 2015 and is expected to be complete in the first quarter of 2016. Throughout the process, US Steel will continue to operate Fairfield Works' steelmaking and finishing operations to serve both flat-rolled and tubular customers in accordance with market requirements.