Posted on 28 Nov 2024
Liuzhou Iron & Steel Group (Liugang), a leading steelmaker in Southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, blew in the No.3 blast furnace (BF) at its steelworks in the coastal city of Fangchenggang on November 26, Luigang has announced.
The commissioning of the third BF also marks the completion of the first phase of Liugang's Fangchenggang project, the release noted. Total Phase 1 investment is put at Yuan 36 billion ($4.96 billion).
The works' No.1 and No. 2 BFs were successfully put into operation in late June 2020 and late November 2021, as reported, and all three units have inner volumes of 3,800 cu metres.
Besides the three BFs, the first phase of the project also hosts four converters giving the works a pig iron capacity of 8.5 million tonnes/year and steelmaking capacity of 9.2 million t/y, Mysteel Global learned.
At Tuesday's commissioning ceremony, Liugang also announced the start of commercial production on its 3.8 m-wide heavy plate mill at Fangchenggang with a capacity of 2.6 million t/y of high-end wide and heavy plate products. Construction took one year to complete, Luigang said.
The Fangchenggang project was first approved by China's central government in 2012 and was co-developed by both Liugang and the then Wuhan Iron & Steel Group (Wugang).
Wugang, which later merged with Baosteel to form Baowu Steel Group, had been left to develop the project alone after Liugang pulled out in 2015 when it was losing money and when the steel industry's serious oversupply situation brought the project under Beijing's increasingly critical gaze. The project was stalled for years until Liugang took over it again in 2018, as Mysteel Global reported.
During this year's January-September period, Liugang's output of finished steel dipped by 8.6% on year to 8.41 million tonnes, according to its latest quarterly report. The steelmaker's business revenues fell by 6.86% on year to Yuan 53.1 billion in the first nine months, and although it reported a net loss of Yuan 307 million for the period, this marked an improvement on its Yuan 516 million loss during the same period last year, Mysteel Global notes.
Source:Mysteel Global
