Nov. 21, 2006 — Steel Dynamics announced that it has decided to suspend its current financial involvement and participation in the four-year-old "Mesabi Nugget" joint venture project.

As a result of the company’s decision, Steel Dynamics’ wholly-owned subsidiary, Ferrous Resources LLC, will no longer participate in the development and construction of a commercial iron nugget plant at Hoyt Lakes, Minn.

The Hoyt Lakes iron nugget plant was a continuation of the Mesabi Nugget project’s validation and commercialization of Kobe's ITmk3 iron nugget technology. Steel Dynamics, along with four other participants — IronUnits LLC (Cleveland Cliffs), Kobe Iron Nugget LLC (Kobe Steel), Ferrometrics, Inc. and Iron Range Resources, an agency of the State of Minnesota — built and operated a pilot plant at Silver Bay, Minn., to validate the technology. The partners have been involved in negotiations over the past several years to build a large-scale demonstration plant as the next phase in the commercialization of the technology.

"While we are pleased that our efforts and those of the other participants in this project to date have established the merits of the iron nugget technology and have confirmed that a large-scale demonstration plant could be constructed to produce commercial quality iron nuggets in sufficient quantity,” stated Mark Millett, Steel Dynamics' Vice President, “we and our joint venture partners have simply not been able to conclude definitive agreements to fully address all of the many operating and financial issues that require resolution prior to our further commitment of time and resources to the project.

“We will continue to explore opportunities to use Kobe's ITmk3 process in another project as and when circumstances change.”