Despite the crisis affecting Brazil’s steel industry, which has an average capacity utilization of around 60 percent, ArcelorMittal is operating at almost full capacity at its Tubarao complex in the city of Vitoria, in the state of Espirito Santo.
“We’re operating at a rate of 7 million mt/year of crude steel,” the CEO of ArcelorMittal in Brazil, Benjamin Baptista Filho, said in an interview.
The company is exporting nearly 70 percent of its output at the Tubarao complex, which has a 7.5 million mt/year capacity, thanks to a favorable exchange rate and increased global steel prices. The Tubarao complex is exporting both slabs and HRC.
Baptista Filho said ArcelorMittal Tubarao is exporting over 3 million mt of slabs, plus 1.5 million mt of HRC, which has seen declined demand in the Brazilian market.
According to the company’s CEO, slab shipments surged after July 2014, following the signing of a contract to supply part of the needs of a US rolling mill in Alabama. AM/NS Calvert was sold by ThyssenKrupp to ArcelorMittal and Nippon Steel & Sumitomo, which co-own the company.
The deal helped Arcelor to restart a blast furnace. The company is now exporting some 1 million mt of slab to AM/NS Calvert in the US.
According to ArcelorMittal, the Tubarao complex uses the integrated steelmaking route to produce slab and roll hot-rolled coils; it is located with access to Praia Mole Marine Terminal and road and railway systems.