Nippon Coke & Engineering Restarts Coke Oven Operation in January

Nippon Coke & Engineering announced on Friday the firm restarts operation of a coke oven in Kitakyusyu coking works in mid January. The firm eases the output reduction when steel makers are recovering crude steel productions. Nippon Coke & Engineering had suspended 2 coke ovens along demand shrinkage and restarted the one in October 2009. In January, the firm will return to operate the all of its 4 coke ovens. The operation rate is 70% at the moment while expected to reach 80-90% in mid January.

1B coke oven will restart in January, which has been hermetically-closed and under hot banking state since April 15th. The capacity of 1B coke oven is 350,000 tonnes per year. The oven wouldn’t reach full production in the initial phase of the restart.

2A coke oven was restarted on October 24th, which had entered hot banking state since May 15th. 2A coke oven’s capacity is 625,000 tonnes per year. 1A coke oven with 500,000 tonnes of yearly capacity and 2B coke oven with 625,000 tonnes of annual capacity have kept operations. The works’ operation rate is 70% in comparison with 1.6 million tonnes of annual capacity excluding 1A coke oven which is applied to consignment production.

Nippon Coke & Engineering entered output reduction in 2008. It was necessary for several ovens to suspend operations to avoid damages on the furnaces. The firm now can adjust the output volume even continuing operation of the all ovens.