V & M Star Wants To Build A Pipe Mill, But Could a Turf War Stand in the Way?

---

Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--V & M Star Steel LP (Youngstown, Ohio) is a joint venture with 80% held by Vallourec & Mannesmann Tubes, a subsidiary of Vallourec S.A. (Boulogne-Billancourt, France), and 20% held by the Sumitomo Corporation (Tokyo, Japan). Late last year, V & M Star announced that, along with anticipation and desire to expand the company's presence in the steel pipe arena, it was exploring options to build a new mill. The Youngstown plant was always the likely choice, already housing V & M Star's 650,000-ton-per-year steel mill.

The project originally called for a new pipe mill and an expansion to the current melt shop, with a budget that was expected to reach $1 billion. After some deliberation, it was decided that the project would be broken into two separate projects: the new pipe mill would carry its own price tag of $700 million, and the melt shop expansion broke out at $300 million. New production levels are expected to reach 1.4 million tons per year.

The new pipe mill will have two pipe-treating lines and a vacuum tank degasser, as well as an extensive array of furnaces, which include electric arc, ladle metallurgy, reheating, hardening, tempering and rotary hearth furnaces. This list represents a small but important portion of the equipment needed for the pipe mill that will be used to produce a new line of small-diameter pipe. Construction has been scheduled to start by summer 2010.

The second portion of the project, the melt shop expansion, which is expected to include millions of dollars in new equipment as well as upgrades and major modifications to the furnaces, is in an earlier stage of development. V& M Star is looking to start this project in early 2012.

Two side-by-side towns are vying for the right to have the new 80-acre plant within their boundaries. Youngstown purchased the land with the expectations of reselling it to V & M Star, but the land is actually in the neighboring city of Girard. Youngstown officials say that V & M Star will only build in Youngstown; if the land cannot be annexed from Gerard, V & M Star will cancel the project. No representatives from V & M Star have commented in regards to this matter.

Much of the populous in general wants the plant to be built and see an increase in employment. There is some support from the Girard city council to allow this transfer of "title" from Girard to Youngstown. As it stands right now, the plant resides in both cities. The entrance to the plant is in Youngstown, while much of the plant already exists in Girard. It's a complicated scenario that is being played out between the two cities and V & M Star.

V & M Star have been aligned closely with two engineering/consulting firms, Middough Incorporated (Cleveland, Ohio) and CH2M Hill Lockwood Greene (Atlanta, Georgia) in the development of this project. It takes tremendous effort, time and resources to complete all the engineering aspects, equipment needs and the permitting processes that are required in seeing a project of this magnitude take flight.

It appears that V & M Star will sit back at this point and let the municipalities of Youngstown and Girard work out the problems that would see this project move from the drawing board to construction to production. The final air permits are in place and are waiting to be used. There is some speculation that the boundary issues will be resolved by the end of the month. The 400 new permanent jobs that are on the line, as well as the hundreds of contractors that would be employed during the building phase, can only help the people of the area, whether the plant is called a Girard plant or a Youngstown plant.

View Plant Profile -1013905
View Project Report - 10004354 10004456

Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the leading provider of global market intelligence specializing in the industrial process, heavy manufacturing and energy related markets. For more than 26 years, Industrial Info has provided plant and project opportunity databases, market forecasts, high resolution maps, and daily industry news.