ArcelorMittal postponed the lauch of an ACB plant in Spain due to low demand

ArcelorMittal Corporation, the Europe’s leading steel producer, has decided to delay the lauch of the Spanish plant Acería Compacta de Bizkaia (ACB) after maintenance in the summer. Eurometal reports about it.

The enterprise was stopped for maintenance in mid-August. The forecast of reduced demand for rolled steel forced the company to delay the resumption of operations for an indefinite period.

“ACB has not restarted for now due to adverse market conditions, such as low demand and sales prices, and high imports from outside the EU. Energy costs are indeed important for an EAF-based steelmaking plant, but this is not the determining factor in this case,” the company commented.

Acería Compacta de Bizkaia is one of the first ArcelorMittal plants in southern Europe that ArcelorMittal stops rather than reduce capacity. Experts expect the company to continue with this policy in the short term. ACB specializes in the production of hot rolled steel and pickled coil through the EAF route.

As GMK Center reported earlier, last week, ArcelorMittal increased the price for long steel by €100/t despite the low demand. The company also insists on increasing the price of flat steel products for deliveries in October-November by €50-100/t – up to €800-850/t. In this way, the company plans to transfer the increase in production costs to the final consumer.

As GMK Center wrote before, in September 2022, some price growth is predicted on the European rolled steel market against the background of the car manufacturers’ activity recovery.