Dramatic photos published last week by Bloomberg Businessweek provided a rare look inside U.S. Steel's Edgar Thomson and Irvin plants as the company is spending $1.2 billion to improve facilities across the country.
The upgrades come as U.S. Steel executives plead with President Trump to get tough on imports. The president has pledged to bring back American manufacturing, including steel production.
The Edgar Thomson plant in Braddock already received a new cooling tower as part of the upgrades. The project cost about $2 million and was completed during the first months of the year.
Later this year, U.S. Steel will invest $1 million to upgrade the discharge table, rolls and bearings of a hot strip mill at the Irvin plant in West Mifflin.
“While this is a larger program, the majority of the projects are not large, complex projects,” U.S. Steel wrote in its second-quarter earnings report. “This means that the projects are easier to execute.”
The Edgar Thomson and Irvin plants are part of U.S. Steel's Mon Valley Works.
U.S. Steel's improvements also will target steel production facilities in Gary, Ind., and along Michigan's Detroit River. The company hopes the upgrades will make steel production more efficient and more reliable and improve the quality of its products while decreasing costs, U.S. Steel wrote in the second-quarter earnings report. The upgrades are expected to increase production capabilities from 10 million tons to 11 million tons annually and increase earnings to up to $325 million a year by 2020.
