U.S. Steel Touts Investment in Gary Works Pig Iron Caster

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--United States Steel Corporation (U.S. Steel) (NYSE:X) (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) recently marked its investment in a pig iron caster at its Gary Works facility in Indiana. The $60 million investment comes at a time when steel producers are contending with global pig iron supply issues due to Russia's war with Ukraine.

The caster will produce 500,000 tons of pig iron per year to feed the company's electric arc furnaces, including meeting up to 50% of the ore-based metallics needs for the Big River Steel Works in Osceola, Arkansas. Iron ore from U.S. Steel's Minntac and Keetac ore operations in Minnesota will feed the caster.

"Mined, melted and made in America has always been important to us, and recent world events have demonstrated how critical self-reliance is," said U.S. Steel President and Chief Executive Officer David Burritt in a press release.

Pre-construction of the caster began in the first quarter of 2022, and startup is expected in early 2023, U.S. Steel said. Subscribers to Industrial Info's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) Metals & Minerals Project Database can click here for a detailed project report. For related information, see May 2, 2022, article - U.S. Steel To Spend Nearly $4 Billion for Arkansas Projects.

Pig iron, or the lack of it thanks to Russia's war with Ukraine, has been a hot topic among the United States' top steel producers.

Russia and Ukraine are among the world's top exporters of pig iron, and the disruptions caused by Russia's invasion of Ukraine have sent steel producers scrambling for the key raw material.

The global merchant trade in pig iron typically amounts to about 12 million tons per year, with as much as 8 million tons coming from Russian and Ukrainian mills, Steel Dynamics Incorporated (NASDAQ:STLD) (Fort Wayne, Indiana) Chief Executive Officer Mark Millett said during the company's recent earnings conference call.

In 2021, the U.S. imported 6 million tons of pig iron, of which 2 million tons were shipped from Russia and 1.68 million from Ukraine, according to FastMarket's metalbulletin.com. Pig iron prices have soared since the start of the war.

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