A wave of heat surges through the hall at the steel-finishing plant in Calvert, Alabama, as a large slab of the metal emerges from a furnace at temperatures of up to 3,000C. Then, glowing like molten lava, the steel slab rumbles towards a series of powerful rollers that turn it into thin metallic sheets.
But there is far more to the process at the plant than extremes of heat and power. The Calvert mill – which ArcelorMittal and Japan’s Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal jointly acquired in February for $1.6bn – produces steel that retains its strength even when rolled out far more thinly than was previously possible.
This combination of power and sophistication makes the Calvert plant a key battleground in the US steel industry’s attempts to defend its traditional role as a key supplier to car manufacturers. The US automotive industry is the steelmakers’ second most important market, but they face a growing challenge from aluminium manufacturers.
The threat came into sharp focus in January when Ford announced a redesign of its F150 pick-up truck – the US’s best-selling vehicle for more than three decades – featuring an all-aluminium body. The new F150 – weighing 700lb (320kg) less than its steel-clad predecessor – will appear later this year and will be the first-ever all-aluminium body on a Ford-branded vehicle.
Scrap over metals
ArcelorMittal has devised plans for a steel-bodied pick-up truck to show carmakers how to build a lighter vehicle out of the metal and therefore avoid resorting to aluminium, which is gaining in popularity in the sector.
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The imperative for carmakers to reduce their vehicles’ weight, and therefore improve fuel efficiency, is being driven in part by stringent new US regulations. These require the manufacturers to almost double their vehicles’ average fuel economy from 27.5 miles per gallon in 2012 to 54.5mpg by 2025.
Steel industry executives insist the type of metal being produced at the Calvert plant can be a vital product for the carmakers, by combining weight reduction with strength.
Blake Zuidema, ArcelorMittal’s head of automotive product applications, says the company has worked hard to show that steel is a “viable solution” for the automotive industry. “We’re working with steels up to 10 times stronger than the mild steels we were using just a few years ago,” he adds.
Source: FT
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