Brazilian steelmaker Usiminas will restart its No2 blast furnace (BF) at the Ipatinga mill, in southeastern Minas Gerais state, after almost eight months of downtime, the company said in a filing with the country's securities and exchange commission, CVM, on Monday June 14.
The BF has capacity to produce 660,000 tonnes per year of crude steel and will be reignited as a result of Brazil's steel consumption growth continuing to outpace supply. All three BFs at Ipatinga will now be operational, with total capacity of around 5 million...