European steelmaker idles aluminizing line in East Chicago

EAST CHICAGO, Ind. (AP) - A Luxembourg-based steelmaker has shut down its aluminizing line along the Indiana Harbor in East Chicago, but the closing doesn't come as a surprise because the company has been warning for months that there's too much steelmaking capacity in the United States.

ArcelorMittal had been planning for more than a year to idle the No. 1 Aluminizing Line in the West Side No. 2 Sheet Mill, formerly the LTV steel mill, and to shift production to its newer plant in Alabama.

"ArcelorMittal is considering all options to optimize our assets in the United States and beyond, including those within Indiana Harbor, in support of the Action 2020 program at our Q4 and full-year 2015 earnings announcement," spokeswoman Mary Beth Holdford said in an email. "In the United States, efforts to support Action 2020 include asset and cost optimization as well as an improved portfolio of high added value products."

About 60 to 80 employees worked in the aluminizing line at ArcelorMittal Indiana Harbor West, where coats of aluminum were applied to steel used for items including car mufflers, furnaces and commercial rooftop HVAC units. But no one lost their jobs because the company restarted the galvanizing line in the No. 2 Sheet Mill in East Chicago, which was once the most productive in the world, before it was idled in late 2014.

The idling of the company's No. 1 Aluminizing Line was originally expected to happen in December 2015, The (Munster) Times (http://bit.ly/1KK9KsR ) reported.

The company has been considering the possibility of idling additional finishing lines at ArcelorMittal Indiana Harbor after utilization capacity in the U.S. fell under 70 percent last year.

"ArcelorMittal expects to optimize our assets in the United States without layoffs by leveraging natural attrition," Holdford said.

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Information from: The Times, http://www.thetimesonline.com