Steel Mills

Cliffs Calls Back Workers Ahead of Northshore Mining Restart

February 21, 2023

Cleveland-Cliffs has called back workers to its idled Northshore Mining operations in Minnesota, a company spokeswoman confirmed.

She declined to say how many workers were being called back or why. “We will provide more details when we decide when and at what capacity this operation will be brought back online,” the spokeswoman said in an email to SMU.

iron ore

The confirmation from Cliffs comes after Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D., Minn.) said on Monday that she had met with Cliffs chairman, president, and CEO Lourenco Goncalves in Washington, D.C., about reopening Northshore.

“I’m glad mining operations will be reopening in Babbitt and Silver Bay and the miners will be returning to work,” Sen. Klobuchar said in a statement.

Minnesota state Sen. Grant Hauschild (D., Hermantown) also tweeted that Cliffs was “beginning the process to reopen their facilities” in Babbitt and Silver Bay.

Northshore Mining is comprised of the Peter Mitchell Mine near Babbitt, Minn., on the Mesabi Iron Range and a pellet processing facility approximately 50 miles away in Silver Bay, Minn., according to a company fact sheet.

Recall that Cliffs said in 2021 it would shift production of direct-reduced (DR) grade pellets – a necessary feedstock for its hot-briquetted iron (HBI) plant in Toledo, Ohio – from Northshore to its Minorca iron ore operations near Virginia, Minn.

Goncalves said then that the company was making the shift away from Northshore because of an “unreasonable” royalty structure there.

“Northshore will become a swing operation,” he said, meaning that it would be idled when demand was not strong enough to support production.

By Michael Cowden, michael@steelmarketupdate.com

Michael Cowden

Michael Cowden is managing editor for Steel Market Update. Cowden has covered the steel industry since 2007. He has since 2014 specialized in flat-rolled steel but has previously reported on steel long products, steel pipe and tube as well as aluminum. Before joining SMU, Cowden held reporting jobs at Fastmarkets AMM in Chicago - where he was involved in launching AMM's daily hot-rolled coil index, the Associated Press in Pittsburgh, and the Cambodia Daily in Phnom Penh. He has also worked as a copy editor and in marketing at the University of Chicago Press. Cowden has a BA in English from the University of Chicago and an MSJ journalism from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. Contact him at michael@steelmarketupdate.com or 724-759-7872.