Nippon Steel Restarts Blast Furnace at Yawata

Nippon Steel restarted no.4 blast furnace at Yawata works at 7:26 am on Wednesday after temporally idle due to fire at coke plant on Tuesday. The works restarted the steel making and rolling operation. The fire at no.5 coke plant was almost quenched while the restart schedule is unknown. The works uses part of coke oven gas, which is provided from adjacent coke maker, Mitsui Mining and is used for power plant, for energy in the works. The works procures around 10,000 tonnes of coke and expects the supply loss could be minimized. The works estimates the pig iron output loss is around 8,300 tonnes during 20-hour long idle. The works usually uses coke oven gas from no.4 and no.5 coke ovens at Yawata and Mitsui Mining for hot blast stove while the works supplies part of the gas for joint venture power plant with Kyushu Electric Power. The works uses coke oven gas for hot blast oven instead to supply for the power plant, which can be operate with liquid natural gas, when no.5 coke oven could take long time to restart. The works procures 10,000 tonnes of coke mainly from other works of Nippon Steel while the works has around 30,000 tonnes or a week of coke inventory.