6 November 2013
Metinvest Group’s Ilyich Iron & Steel Works of Mariupol completed a UAH 55 million major overhaul of its Converter #3, as part of its strategic production modernization program.
The major overhaul included the full dismantling and further inspection and installation of all key units and mechanisms of Converter #3 and its heat recovery boiler. In order to optimize repairs and save time, for the following major units were assembled: steel structures and equipment with a weight of 1,000 tons was lifted with jacks, installed on special-purpose truck platforms, brought to and taken out of the installation site. The metal used in the heat recovery boiler’s pipes underwent a control analysis. To improve steelmakers' working conditions and ensure safety, an additional housing was installed over the converter, more efficient supply schemes for ferroalloys and auxiliary materials were developed, and an oil supply control system via special-purpose converter bearings was implemented.
The environmental impact of refurbishing the cleaning equipment in the steelmaking unit was one of the most important parts of the overhaul. Workers cleaned all of the units within the gas purification system and its ducts from process deposits and adjusted the devices. This will bring emissions to their designed level and reduce them in the future.
The overhaul of Converter #3 will increase the time between repairs in the steelmaking unit to ten years.
Ilyich Iron & Steel Works of Mariupol’s strategic modernization program also envisages upgrades to key process equipment, industrial buildings and structures, and transportation in 2013. The plant has invested about UAH 350 million in the program.
Andrey Shishatsky, chairman of the Donetsk Regional State Administration, and Yuriy Khotlubey, mayor of Mariupol, took part in commissioning ceremony of Converter #3, together with Yuriy Zinchenko, Ilyich Iron & Steel Works of Mariupol’s general director.
Zinchenko thanked all of the 500 plant's workers who participated in the overhaul.
"Upgrading the manufacturing capacity of our plant is one of the key factors that ensures a stable and steady presence in markets and where we can show our competitive advantage compared to other steel products manufacturers,” Zinchenko said. “This is very important today. That is why clear and timely major overhauls, as with the converter shop, allow the plant's workers to take on complicated and responsible tasks to improve the safety of process and power equipment, reduce production costs and improve the quality of the products that we manufacture."
Shishatsky said, "Despite the crisis, the Ilyich plant is becoming stronger. This is your future, because the plant has a clear development strategy including technological progress and an environmental component. The plant's employees have a good social package, and this is the basis for policy by Rinat Akhmetov, the main shareholder of Metinvest Group – a person whose words and actions mean the same."
Khotlubey said, "It is possible to implement such projects during a very severe economic crisis only within Metinvest, a large holding. It has the ability to find funds for upgrading and modernization to achieve the highest production standards."
- For editors:
PJSC «Ilyich Iron and Steel Works of Mariupol» is one of the greatest enterprises in Ukraine with full metallurgical cycle. The Works produces pipes and flat rolled products of carbon, low-alloy and alloy steels for different applications: hot-rolled plates and sheets intended for the production of pipes for main pipelines, ships, pressure vessels, bridge constructions, other metal constructions for critical application; hot-rolled plates, sheets and strips including pickled; cold-rolled, including galvanized, bands, sheets and strips, including for cold stamping, flooring and others; thick-walled pipes including for oil pipe lines; water- and gas-supply welded thin-walled pipes of circular section and structural pipes of rectangular section; flasks for different compressed gases, including automobile and others.
50 certificates issued by seven International Certification Bodies and Ukraine Certification Centers confirm the high quality of the metal products of 200 steel grades produced at the Works. Quality Management System functions at the PJSC «Ilyich Iron and Steel Works of Mariupol» developed and certified according to the requirements of ISO 9001.
Production facilities of the Works allow to produce about 6,1 million tons of steel per year, 12 million tons of agglomerate, more than 5,5 million tons of pig-iron, more than 6,1 million tons of steel including converter steel – 3,6 million tons, more than 5 million tons of finished rolled products.METINVEST is an international vertical-integrated mining-and-metallurgical Group of companies, which runs assets in every link of production chain from iron-ore and coal mining till semi-finished and finished metal products manufacture. The structure of the Group comprises mining and metallurgical enterprises in Ukraine, Europe and USA, and sales network covering the key world markets. METINVEST GROUP consists of Metallurgical and Mining Divisions. According to the strategical vision of the Group its aim is to become lead European vertical-integrated steel producer with stable ratio of growth and cost effectiveness in spite of market cyclicity, and to ensure investment return higher than industrial standards. In the first half of 2012 the Group has received US$6,74 milliards of sale proceeds, cost effectiveness by EBITDA was 16%.
METINVEST HOLDING LLC is the managing company of METINVEST GROUP.
The main shareholders of METINVEST B.V. Company (holding company of METINVEST GROUP) are SKM GROUP (71,25%) and SMART-HOLDING (23,75%), which control Company at partnership relations.