While celebrating the startup of ThyssenKrupp AG’s new processing plant in Alabama, Executive Board Chairman Dr. Ekkehard Schulz announced that construction was set to begin on a new stainless slab meltshop for ThyssenKrupp Stainless USA.

The complete meltshop will comprise a 160-ton electric arc furnace, 180-ton AOD (Argon Oxygen Decarburization) converter, and 72-inch (1900-mm) continuous caster with an annual capacity 900,000 to one million tons.

“Our plans always included building a meltshop to produce stainless steel slabs. ThyssenKrupp is a reliable partner and stands by this pledge,” said Schulz at the official opening of the new processing plant. “We continue to believe in the need for an optimized and fully integrated stainless steel production site on the North American market, which is why we have stuck to the full scope of the project.”

Stainless steel slabs produced by the new meltshop will be rolled into hot band on the hot strip mill of sister company ThyssenKrupp Steel USA. Around 340,000 tons per year of this hot band will go to ThyssenKrupp Mexinox in San Luis Potosí (Mexico), with another roughly 525,000 tons per year to be transformed in the cold rolling mill into 175,000 tons of white hot-rolled (up to 10 millimeter thickness) and 350,000 tons of stainless cold-rolled (0.5 - 5 millimeter thickness).

Startup of the meltshop is scheduled for December 2012. Until then, ThyssenKrupp Stainless USA is being supplied with slabs from the group’s European mills. “Once our meltshop is in operation we will have a state-of-the-art, fully integrated production site for stainless steel flat products here in Calvert,” said Dr. Ulrich Albrecht-Früh, CEO of ThyssenKrupp Stainless USA. “We will then extend our product range to 72-inch widths for special grades as well.”

ThyssenKrupp Stainless USA has been working with ThyssenKrupp Steel USA on the construction of the new Alabama carbon and stainless steel flat products site since 2007. The total capital investment for the integrated stainless plant in Calvert is around 1.4 billion US dollars. Stainless production began at the end of September with one cold rolling mill and other equipment. Foundation work for the hot-rolled annealing and pickling line began in January 2010, with startup planned for fall 2011. Startup of a further cold rolling mill is scheduled for the same time.

ThyssenKrupp is already well positioned with stainless steel flat products on the NAFTA market. It has a market share of roughly 12% in the USA and over 15% in Canada, while in Mexico the company is market leader with over 70%. To date, most products have come from the ThyssenKrupp Mexinox plant and the European sites of the Stainless group. Marketing is carried out by a sales company in Chicago, which is now also marketing the products made by ThyssenKrupp Stainless USA in Calvert.