Big River Steel Delivers First Hot Rolled Coil

Big River Steel announced that operations have begun at its melt shop and hot strip mill. The first hot rolled coil was purchased by Zekelman Industries and will be sent to Atlas Tube in nearby Blytheville, Arkansas. The coil was purchased for $100,000 with the entire amount jointly contributed by Big River and Zekelman Industries to the Wounded Warrior Project and Arkansas Northeastern College.

Under construction since July 2014, Big River is commissioning some of the world’s newest steelmaking technology and will recycle approximately 2 million tons of scrap metal and other metallics to produce 1.6 million tons of finished steel products annually. The company’s Flex Mill™ is the first in North America to connect an electric arc furnace (EAF) to a Ruhrstahl Heraeus degasser and will be the only EAF mill in the United States to produce hot rolled steel as thick as 1” and as wide as 78”. Based on the technology being employed and the design of the facility, Big River will produce steel grades previously only available via integrated mills. When fully operational in early 2017, the mill will produce a range of material dimensions and strength levels never before produced in an EAF mill.