South Korean steel major POSCO has scheduled the overhaul of the blast furnace No. 4 at Gwangyang works from Feb’22 to May’22. Accordingly, in the first quarter, it is expected that the steelmaker will increase the production of semi-finished steel (slabs) that will be used for making finished steel during this maintenance period.
The company expects that steel production will decrease by about 1 million tonne (mn t) during the overhaul but before this, the production will be increased as much as possible. As a result, demand for scrap is more likely to rise in the first quarter of CY’22.
POSCO’s total scrap inventory is over 160,000 t. It is also heard that the inventory held at Gwangyang works has reached 120,000 t which is the highest since CY’15.
POSCO’s daily warehousing volume is about 1,500-2,000 t at present. During the overhaul, the stocking has to be controlled. After the controls lift. the stocking volume is expected to increase slightly, but it will be difficult to recover to the normal level due to the fact that since it is the end of the year, there will be scarcity of stocks in the market. However, suppliers expect that the daily warehousing volume will increase by about 1,000 t after the the lifting of warehousing control at POSCO’s Gwangyang works.
The latest daily warehousing capacity of other special steel makers like SeAH Besteel is around 4,000 t and Hyundai steel’s Dangjin works at around 7,000 t. SeAH Besteel’s daily warehousing volume is 3,000 t less than usual, and that at Hyundai steel’s Dangjin works’ is about 2,000 t less than usual.
Note: This article has been published under an article exchange agreement between Steel Daily and SteelMint.
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