[ferro-alloys.com]Nucor has temporarily idled its Louisiana direct-reduced iron (DRI) facility due to impacts resulting from the coronavirus pandemic, a spokeswoman for the company said Monday.

"With the state of Louisiana having been particularly hard hit by the Covid-19 outbreak and economic uncertainty nationwide, we have temporarily suspended operations at our Nucor Louisiana direct reduced iron plant," a Nucor spokeswoman said. "Our steel mills that use DRI as feedstock continue to operate and are utilizing existing DRI inventory."

"We do not expect this outage to impact our steelmaking operations and we have not laid off any teammates. With the exception of a small maintenance crew on site, we have sent all teammates home as a precautionary measure to ensure their health and wellness.

Natural gas usage at the 2.5 million mt/year Louisiana DRI facility had begun declining since the last week of March and ceased entirely by April 3, according to S&P Global Platts natural gas delivery data.

Nucor operates a 2 million mt/year DRI facility in Trinidad as well, which was also temporarily idled last week in compliance with government orders issued to combat the coronavirus pandemic.

(S&P Global Platts)

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