Wednesday, December 7, 2011


New steel expansion projects in China focus on BOF rather than EAF

In China, EAF operations still contribute only marginally to crude steel output, compared to BOFs.

Of all the companies with steel melting equipment listed in the Metal Bulletin Company Database (www.mbdatabase.com), 75% use EAF technology (they are also known as mini-mills), 25% are BOF operations (also known as integrated steel mills). However, given the much larger average capacity of integrated operations, the relationship is inverted from a capacity point of view, with BOF accounting for 75% of capacity compared to EAFs’ 25%.

Metal Bulletin Company Database shows the prevalence of integrated operations in China. For this country the Database lists 50 BOF and 42 EAF operations, but, from a capacity point of view, BOFs account for 85% of the total, while EAFs for 15%.

Carbon steel is by far the largest section of the BOF steel business with 96% of the BOF Chinese companies on the MB Company Database producing carbon steel semis, longs or flat products. 60% produce non-stainless alloy steel and 20% produce stainless steel. For EAF producers, alloyed steels are a more prevalent, with only 66% of the mills producing carbon steel, while 24% produce stainless and 35% of companies listed produce non-stainless alloy steels.

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