Steel Facility Upgrade
POSCO will invest about 1.05 trillion won (US$921.11 million) to upgrade its facility in Pohang steel mill this year. Starting with the third improvement of the blast furnace 3, the company will replace the electric furnace 3 in the plant 2 and strengthen the competitiveness of generating facilities at the same time.
POSCO held the “Starting Ceremony for Facilities Advancement Investment for Next 50 Years” at a function room in Pohang steel mill on Feb. 27 and started the project.
The third refurbishment work for its third blast furnace, which is the single largest construction project, has started on the same day. Beginning with separating the main body of blast furnace from refractory, the company aims to complete the work in 109 days at a cost of 370 billion won (US$326.13 million) and 120,000 man-days. The third blast furnace, which was completed in Dec. 1978, had the first refurbishment in 1989 and the second refurbishment in 2006. It has produced more than 40 million tons of molten iron for 11 years since then. In 2007, it achieved the average amount of molten metal up to 2.83t/d.㎥, setting a new world record.
Once the repair works are completed, the furnace will expand the internal space to 5,600 cubic meters from current 4,350 square meters and become the most competitive facility with boosted output.
During the refurbishment construction period, 280,000 man-days of new jobs will be created as the project requires a lot of construction workers in the civil engineering, construction, machinery, shaft tunnel and electricity sectors for dissolution and installation and employees of investment companies and outsourcing partner companies as well as maintenance staff.