OREANDA-NEWS. August 15, 2013. ArcelorMittal last week announced that it is to restart an expansion project at its Monlevade and Juiz de Fora sites in Brazil, which will increase production capacity from 3.75 to 4.9 million tonnes a year.

The news came as part of the second quarter and half year 2013 financial results released by the company on 1 August. Speaking to the news wires on the day, company CFO Aditya Mittal explained: “We now see that demand is coming back in Brazil; it is slower than we had anticipated but it is coming back and that is why we have restarted the wire rod mill expansion which is a US\\$180m project.”

The expansion was first announced in 2007 but paused in 2009 due to the economic crisis and weak demand. The project is expected to be completed in two phases with the first phase (investment in which has now been approved) focused mainly on downstream facilities. Start-up is expected in 2015. The upstream portion of the investment remains on hold.

Monlevade will produce 1.05 million tonnes per year of coil thanks to a capex investment of US\\$140m. Rebar capacity at Juiz de Fora will also be increased from 50,000 to 400,000 tonnes a year and the site’s melt shop will produce an extra 200,000 tonnes of billets per year using its new ladle and new sixth strand in the continuous caster.

The additional wire rod from Monlevade is aimed at increasing the supply of high added value products mainly to the domestic construction and automotive industries. Juiz de Fora’s additional rebar is expected to go into downstream cut and bend operations and to civil construction end users.