Oct 22 2004
IPSCO Inc. announced today it has selected Mobile, Alabama as the location to build its new continuous plate heat treating operation, which will be one of the most modern facilities of its kind in the world. In addition, the Company also announced it has awarded the major contract for the design and supply of equipment to LOI Inc. of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The $45,000,000 facility will produce 170,000 tons per year of heat treated plate, quenched and tempered or normalized, ranging in thickness from 3/16" to 3" at widths up to 123". The size range and capacity of the line have been sized to fill the available supply void in North America. The 140,000 sq. ft. greenfield site facility will include a shot blast station, hot leveler, stenciler and shear, all of which will be fully automated.
As part of the contract with LOI Inc., process technology for the furnaces and the quench will be provided by LOI Thermprocess of Essen, Germany, which over the past 15 years, has provided 90% of the world’s plate heat treat lines and currently has three finalized contracts in-house for projects in Egypt and China with two others under negotiation, both in Asia.
“While this capacity will reduce the availability of as-rolled plate from the Mobile Steelworks, it will add to the Company’s strategy of providing value-added capability to the market” said John Tulloch, Executive Vice President, Steel. “We have strong customer commitments and we are very pleased to be working with LOI to complete this facility. IPSCO has had a very positive experience building and operating its steel operations in Mobile and the support of customers, regulatory authorities, employees and the community has justified locating this new processing line in Alabama” he continued.
Based on agreed schedules the Normalizing Line is expected to start operations in fourth quarter of 2005 and the Quench and Temper Unit in first quarter of 2006.
For more information on heat treatment, click here.