October 07, 2008

Chongqing plans to incorporate 12 steel mills

Southwest China based century old steel producer Chongqing Iron & Steel Co Ltd, further plans to incorporate the 12 regional steel mills of the city and raise its capacity to some 6.3 million tonnes per year, following the construction work in Changshou anticipated to complete by 2009, which represents two phases of it's relocation move.

Originally built in Wuhan as Hanyang Iron Works by famous governor Mr Zhang Zhidong in 1890, the plant had been moved to Dadukou of Chongqing 1938 and is heading for Changshou now.

When Mr Donglin board chairman was appointed last year, the group was seriously loss making, losing over CNY 140 million within three months. Last June, Mr Dong visited municipal leaders and asked for approval of Chongqing Steel's relocation project. This March, the municipality authorized green light officially out of environment protection concern.

Mr Dong disclosed that Chongqing Steel aims to upgrade structure and innovate technology along with the relocation activity. The 1780mm HR strip lines and 4100mm wide and thick plate mills, the keynote construction items in first phase, have reportedly found the contractors to start construction next year and come on stream 2009. When constructions in Changshou, i.e. relocation of existing capacitates of 3.5 million tonnes complete, it will further incorporate 12 local steel mills by eliminating their backward techniques and binding the capacities to the new steelmaker in Changshou.

(Sourced from MySteel.net)