Steel production in Great Lakes Increases to 677,000 tonnes

WASHINGTON (Scrap Monster): Production of raw steel in Great Lakes of the U.S increased to about 677,000 tonnes last week. This is for the first time in this year it exceeds the last year’s figure.

According to the estimation done by American Iron and Steel Institute, the net steel output in U.S increased by around 2.7 pct in the week that ended Saturday. The domestic steel production boosted up by 23,000 metric tonnes i.e., up by 3.5 pct.

Most of raw steel is taken from regions of Indiana and Chicago. Southern District is the second largest steel producing region in the country, which also recorded an increase in production up to 660,000 tons and it was about 640,000 tonnes in the previous week.

But the domestic steel production last week showed a slight decrease from that of previous week. Last week, net domestic steel production the country was around 1.853 million tonnes, but in previous week, it was about 1.863 million tonnes.

Capacity utilization rate was about 79.1 pct last week and a week earlier it was 77 pct. So far this year U.S mills have delivered around 50.7 million tonnes of steel, which was 0.1 pct more than that of previous year.

According of American Iron and Steel Institute, Shipment also increased by 2 pct in May over April. It was up 4.4 pct over 2013. The steel mills of U.S shipped about 8.3 million tonnes in May and in previous month it was 8.2 million tonnes.

But, the steel export dropped to 1.04 million tonnes in May, a 10.9 percent year-over-year decrease. According to the American Institute for International Steel, this is mainly due to the poor demand from the Dominican Republic and the European Union

Exports had surged by 3.8 percent in April and 15 percent in March. However, exports for the year are down 7.3 percent to 5 million tonnes.

Canada, the largest importer of steel made in the U.S, has achieved the largest year-to-date drop in U.S. imports.