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Arcelor Mittal ‘hot idles’ its Monessen plant

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Work has ceased temporarily at the ArcelorMittal coke production plant in Monessen.

Production there ended June 23, the company reported. “That was the last day that we pushed coke from the ovens and pushed the ovens empty,” an employee said in an email. Cleanup was completed Thursday.

The plant is in a “hot idle” mode, during which a company maintains a facility with the possibility of reopening. An email from ArcelorMittal did not specify a target date for resuming operations.

Officials in early May gave a 60-day notice to 180 members of United Steelworkers Local 3403 that it planned to hot idle the Monessen plant the first week of July.

A spokesperson from ArcelorMittal cited business disruptions related to the COVID-19 pandemic, “throughout the world and increasingly across the United States,” as the reason for the temporary shutdown.

“We must adapt our production and cost structures to match our customers’ demand … At this time, we do not know when the market conditions will improve to allow us to restart our coke batteries (in Monessen).”

ArcelorMittal S.A. is a global steel manufacturer based in Luxembourg City. The company, according to its website, has 190,000 employees, manufactures steel in 18 countries and shipped 84.5 million tons of steel in 2019.

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