Steel Products
Cliffs Pushes Back Burns Harbor 'C' Blast Furnace Reline to '26
Written by Laura Miller
July 25, 2023
Cleveland-Cliffs is pushing back the reline of the C blast furnace at its Burns Harbor steel mill in northwest Indiana, executives said on the company’s second quarter earnings call on Tuesday, July 25.

The BF reline, originally planned for 2025, has been pushed to 2026, CFO and executive VP Celso Goncalves said on the call.
Chairman, president, and CEO Lourenco Goncalves said the change was based on updated operational information. “Through this quarter, our conviction is that the furnace is in great shape,” he said, thus “the postponement to 2026 is perfect.”
The Burns Harbor plant, Cliffs’ second-largest facility, has two BFs and can produce nearly 5 million net tons of raw steel annually. Both its C and D furnaces have daily iron-making capacities of 7,400 tons, according to SMU’s blast furnace status table.
When asked about the reline schedule across Cliffs’ operations, Goncalves explained that relines were completed at its largest BF, No. 7 in Indiana Harbor, in 2021 and at its Cleveland Works last year. The next BF in line after Burns Harbor would be at Middletown Works in Ohio, “but it’s not going to happen before 2027,” he said.

Laura Miller
Read more from Laura MillerLatest in Steel Products

EU HR prices gain ground on US, Asian HR still well behind
Section 232 returned on March 12, and since then, the price gap between offshore and US hot band has tightened.

SMU Community Chat replay now available
The latest SMU Community Chat webinar reply is now available on our website to all members. After logging in at steelmarketupdate.com, visit the community tab and look under the “previous webinars” section of the dropdown menu. All past Community Chat webinars are also available under that selection. If you need help accessing the webinar replay, or if your company […]

SSAB announces $74M expansion in Alabama
The project will expand heat treat capacity at its Axis, Alabama plant

Service centers: Mill orders retreat in March
SMU’s Mill Order Index declined in March after repeated gains at the start of the year, according to our latest service center inventories data.

Nucor maintains plate prices
Nucor aims to keep plate prices flat with the opening of its June order book.