The Ukrainian Metinvest wants to build a new steel plant in Trieste
Ukraine's Metinvest plans to build a new steelmaking plant in Italy. An executive of the company communicated that this plan complements that of investments in Bulgaria and Romania.
“Many have talked about the fact that we are evaluating the possibility of building a new plant in Italy. Indeed, this is so ,” Metinvest CEO Yuriy Ryzhenkov said in an interview on the group's website. Ryzhenkov did not provide technical details on the plant or the products it would produce, but he specified that the ore used and the basic semi-finished product will be a quality product from Ukraine.
A source told MetalMiner that the future steel mill will likely produce flat-rolled products. The source added that the area around Trieste is a possible location for the plant. However, they warned that position could change.
New site to be added to the Metinvest chain
Trieste and the surrounding Friuli Venezia Giulia region are located in northeastern Italy. The area borders the Gulf of Trieste, which is part of the Adriatic Sea, and Slovenia. Trieste is a large port communicating with central Europe and the rest of Italy, and also has excellent rail connections with Eastern Europe.
Metinvest already has two flat rolling sites in northern Italy. Furthermore, the first, Metinvest Trametal, is also in Friuli Venezia Giulia. According to information on that resource's website, the facility boasts a capacity of 600,000 metric tons per year, rolling plates in 4-180mm to a maximum width of 3200mm.
Metinvest's second steel production plant, Ferriera Valsider, is located in Veneto. This site can produce up to 400,000 metric tons per year of heavy plate in thicknesses from 8 to 200mm and widths up to 3,000mm. It can also produce 600,000 metric tons of HRC per year in gauges from 1.8-25mm up to a maximum width of 1555mm.
Transportation of Ukrainian steel products to Europe expands
In other updates on Ukrainian steel production, state railway operator Ukrzaliznytsia announced on July 13 the incorporation of Ukrainian railways Cargo Poland. The new initiative aims to facilitate rail movements between the country and the European market and is essential for transporting iron ore to Italy.
The railway operator quoted board member Vyacheslav Yeromin as saying that “the creation of such a company is dictated by the need to develop and increase cargo turnover between Ukraine and the European Union and is one of the components of Ukrzaliznytsia's strategy for the development and development of rail freight transport”.
The width between the rails on the Ukrainian railway network is broad gauge, measuring 1,520 mm. Meanwhile, Poland and most of mainland Europe use 1,435mm standard gauge track. Yeromin added that the newly registered steel company will also work with broad gauge rolling stock in addition to standard, which will facilitate the shipment of the iron to Europe.
The Russian army continues to maintain the blockades on Ukrainian ports, which began with its invasion in February 2022 and this, for the moment, obliges to send the ore by land.
There are currently only two broad-gauge railway lines connecting Ukraine to Central Europe. The broad gauge metallurgical line runs from the Polish-Ukrainian border to Sawków. Also, the Uzhhorod–Košice line from what is now the Slovakian-Ukrainian border to US Steel Košice. Each of these lines was originally intended to supply iron ore to steel mills. Now the question is either of extending these lines as far as Italy or, conversely, of building one with European gauge that reaches as far as the heart of Ukraine. A huge investment, but sooner or later it will become necessary. The alternative is the use of dual gauge rolling stock.
Italy could have offered Taranto, but, obviously, the port is not useful for the Ukrainian material and the steel mill has too many problems for the international market…
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The article The Ukrainian Metinvest wants to build a new steel plant in Trieste comes from Scenari Economici .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/lucraina-metinvest-vuole-costruire-una-nuova-acciaieria-a-trieste/ on Tue, 25 Jul 2023 17:07:42 +0000.