ArcelorMittal has hot-idled its coke battery plant in Monessen Pennsylvania in early July to overcome the disruptions in business caused by COVID-19.
The plant’s customers have been significantly affected by the virus, which has, in turn, led to a drop in demand, ArcelorMittal’s spokesperson told Davis Index, adding that the decision was made to match the reduced demand and keep up with cost structures.
The spokesperson added that the plant had to layoff employees at many of ArcelorMittal’s operations to align with customer demand, but did not specify how many employees would be laid off during the hot idling of the Monessen plant.
The firm plans to reopen the plant once the market conditions improve. That said, the steelmaker plans to maintain the plant during the idling period to make it easier to restart it at a later date.
The 336,000mt per year coking plant provides coke to ArcelorMittal’s Cleveland furnaces and employs close to 179 people.