RMDAS statistics confirm June price drops; AISI reports a steel output setback in second full week of June.
The ferrous scrap and steel markets in the United States, which have enjoyed strong pricing and demand in the post-COVID-19 restrictions rebounding economy, seem to be heading into the summer with reduced momentum.
Domestic mill scrap buying statistics maintained by the Raw Material Data Aggregation Service (RMDAS) of Pittsburgh-based MSA Inc. and released June 20 confirm what other pricing services reported earlier in June: Ferrous scrap dropped in value by some $45 to $60 per ton in the past 30 days.
According to RMDAS, price drops in the July 20 to June 19 period included a $78 per ton loss in value for prompt scrap in the South as the worst drop and a $34 per ton loss for shredded scrap in its North Midwest region as the smallest price reduction.
From March to May, prompt scrap had been purchased at more than $700 per ton in the U.S., but the average per ton price fell to $650 in June.
Shredded scrap, meanwhile, temporarily peaked at $604 per ton as an April average, but by June 20 was down to $481 per ton in value.
No. 1 Heavy melting steel (HMS), meanwhile, fell below $400 per ton for the first time this year, averaging $395 in June, per RMDAS.
Tepid demand from overseas has been assigned some of the blame for the downward drift in HMS in particular, but domestic mill demand for all grades also has hit some speed bumps.
According to the Washington-based American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI), domestic raw steel production in the week ending June 18 was 1.758 million tons. That is down 1.5 percent from the previous week (ending June 11) when production was 1.784 million tons.
Comparing this June with June of last year also is unencouraging. The most recent week’s production represents a 4.7 percent decrease from 1.84 million tons produced the week ending June 18, 2021.
According to AISI, mills in the U.S. are operating at an 80.5 percent capability utilization (capacity) rate now, while they were running at an 83 percent rate one year ago.
Year-to-date production through June 18 sits at some 42.4 million tons made at an average capacity rate of 80.7 percent. The output figure is down 1.8 percent from the 43.2 million tons made during the same period last year, when the capacity rate averaged 79.4 percent.
Arkansas Poly & Printing will supply maker of recycled-content decking with plastic scrap.
Arkansas Poly & Printing (APP), a Van Buren, Arkansas-based producer of flexible consumer packaging, and Virginia-based Trex Co., a maker of wood-alternative decking and railing outdoor building products, have entered into a scrap supply agreement.
Via what the two firms are calling a partnership, APP will supply postindustrial and postconsumer resin-based packaging products for recycling to Trex to be used in the making of its composite products for the residential building market.
“Commercial partners like Arkansas Poly are essential to Trex’s sourcing efforts,” says Zach Lauer, vice president of supply chain with Trex. “We are excited to join forces with a company that shares our vision of driving recycling for plastic films and pleased to be establishing meaningful connections with our new neighbors in Arkansas.”
Sarah Sparks Diebold, a co-owner of APP, says, “Our mission of making quality packaging with the least impact to the environment is in perfect alignment with Trex, and we could not be happier to welcome them to Arkansas. This alliance further exhibits our commitment to sustainability within the packaging industry and adds value to our products by providing a tangible ‘next life’ for our resin-based packaging in the form of beautiful and high-performance Trex outdoor living products.”
APP describes itself as a vertically integrated Flexo-packaging manufacturer that extrudes, prints and converts flexible film for industrial and consumer packaging purposes. The company says it has a focus on diverting plastic films from landfills by developing materials it considers readily recyclable.
Trex composite decking is made from 95 percent recycled and reclaimed materials, including a mix of industrial wood scrap and polyethylene (PE) plastic film. Each year, the company repurposes more than 200,000 tons of discarded commercial and post-consumer plastics, says the company, calling itself “one of the largest recyclers of plastic film in North America.”
In addition to its manufacturing facilities in Virginia and Nevada, Trex is in the process of building what will be its third U.S. production site in Arkansas, at the Port of Little Rock. The approximately $400 million campus will include buildings dedicated to decking and railing production, warehousing, reclaimed wood storage, and plastic film recycling and processing. The new PE processing facility will enable the company to collect and process even more plastic scrap through what it calls its ever-expanding network and NexTrex commercial and community recycling programs.
Equipment provider says its Chamber Expert Service boosts its ability to assist customers remotely.
Metso Outotec, a Finland-based global provider of aggregates processing equipment, is launching what it calls its Chamber Expert Service. Metso Outotec describes the new service as one that brings its “wide selection of crusher wear parts with crushing process-specific application instructions delivered to the customer’s crushing site.”
The service uses Metso Outotec’s online wear part product catalogue and the Chamber Pro online simulation tool to help “select the optimal chamber geometry and crushing parameters” that match the customer’s production targets and the specific crushing process, the firm says.
In aggregates creation processes, the optimal chamber geometry and crushing parameters improve process performance and reduce energy consumption and maintenance costs, yielding an increase in saleable products and a longer wear part life cycle, Metso Outotec adds.
“The service has been developed in response to customers’ increasing demand for continuous improvements in process performance,” says Jarkko Leppänen, vice president at Metso Outotec.
Leppänen adds, “The correct wear part and verified sizing make a clear and sustainable difference for the customer’s crushing process.”
Jukka Salovaara, a global business support manager at the company, says, “The Chamber Pro simulator enables us to predict how changing chamber geometry and crusher running parameters affect machine performance, so we can give tangible production commitments.”
Metso Outotec lists benefits of Chamber Expert Service as: finding the best performing chamber to match customer capacity and quality targets; ensuring optimal chamber geometry and crushing parameters; yielding improved process performance and lower energy consumption, bringing improved sustainability benefits; boosting cost efficiency without a major investment in new equipment; and tracking verified wear part lifetime.
More information about Metso Outotec’s Chamber Expert Service can be found here.
Following its acquisition of Blastrac, Husqvarna has rebranded several lines of floor surface preparation machines.
Following its acquisition of Blastrac, announced in November 2020, Husqvarna Construction, Stockholm, Sweden, has launched several rebranded Blastrac and Diamatic surface preparation products.
As of June 17, the product line includes floor scrapers, shavers, scarifiers and floor grinders and is available in the United States and Canada.
“Bolstering Husqvarna’s current concrete grinding offering [are] some exciting new products—the addition of scarifiers, scrappers and shavers,” Husqvarna Product Marketing Manager Levi Smiley says. “We have one of the best offerings in each application and product segment because we are striving to not only be specialists in the surface preparation industry, but also the partner of choice for customers.
Husqvarna's walk-behind and ride floor scrapers can be used to remove soft and hard floor coverings, adhesives and coatings in electric-, battery- and propane-powered options.
The company's walk-behind elite concrete shaver and ride milling machines are chosen when operators want to achieve enhanced depths in a controlled pattern. Husqarna’s scarifiers are designed to quickly and cleanly remove concrete to help level slabs, expose large aggregate before concrete polishing and remove coatings in demolition applications.
Single and planetary grinders remove coatings, prepare and polish concrete floors. The machines feature electric and gas single-disc grinders, and the planetary grinders are available in electric- and propane-powered versions.
Husqvarna says the company has enhanced its existing surface preparation portfolio by bringing advanced shot-blasting, scraping, shaving and scarifying solutions to Husqvarna customers and partners. In turn, Blastrac customers and partners now have access to adjacent products such as compactors, concrete placement equipment, sawing and drilling equipment and demolition robots, as well as a wide service offering, Levi says.
Steel Dynamics, U.S. Steel join Nucor in second quarter guidance pointing to profits.
Two more United States-based steel producers have joined Nucor Corp. in offering second quarter 2022 earnings guidance that point to the likelihood of sizable profits.
Fort Wayne, Indiana-based electric arc furnace (EAF) mill operator Steel Dynamics Inc. (SDI) is referring to “record second-quarter 2022 earnings guidance” it places in the range of $6.33 to $6.37 per diluted share.
Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel Corp. is likewise pointing to “a new all-time best second-quarter performance” in the current timeframe. The operator of both blast furnace/basic oxygen furnace and EAF mills is predicting second quarter 2022 adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of approximately $1.6 billion, or in the range of $3.83 to $3.88 per diluted share.
EAF producer SDI says its profits exclude the impact from costs associated with the startup of the company’s Sinton, Texas, flat roll steel mill.
Second-quarter 2022 earnings from the company’s metals recycling operations, which includes those of subsidiary OmniSource Corp., are expected to be “significantly higher than sequential first-quarter results, based on strong demand supporting increased shipments and higher pricing,” says SDI.
SDI’s second-quarter 2022 profitability from its steel operations is expected to be historically strong but lower than first-quarter 2022 results in light of lower earnings from the company’s flat roll steel operations, as lower average flat-roll steel pricing is expected to more than offset increased flat roll steel shipments.
Demand for SDI long steel products is strong, says SDI, “supporting increased average realized pricing and expected record shipments for the company’s Engineered Bar Products, Roanoke Bar, and Structural and Rail steel divisions.
David B. Burritt, president and CEO of U.S. Steel, comments, “We expect to continue delivering record performance in the second quarter, with each business segment meaningfully contributing to profitability. Our broad end-market exposure keeps our business resilient with demand across a diverse customer base, including the resurging energy market. Our focus on strategic end markets and the continued realization of significantly increased fixed-price contracts is again expected to generate another quarter of record performance.”
Commenting on the company’s capital allocation strategy, Burritt continues, “Our balance sheet remains strong with an overfunded pension plan and no significant debt maturities until 2029. Our strategic projects are pre-funded, with a current cash position approaching $3 billion, and we accelerated our stock buybacks in the second quarter. We continue to invest in the business with high confidence and are well-positioned to execute on our Best for All strategy and capital allocation framework.”