Celsa, the Spanish-headquartered longs producer, could start producing rebar in France from the end of this year. The steelmaker is moving forward its plans to build two rolling mills at its EAF-based billet-making facility in the south of the country.

According to the information released by the local authorities of Tarnos, where Celsa has its billet plant, the project is finally set to be constructed. The company received approval to build two rolling mills at the plant in 2016 (see Kallanish 25 March 2016).

This year one of the two rolling mills could become operational. Earlier in 2016 it was calculated the the construction of two rolling mills would lift the billet output at the mill from 700,000 tonnes/year to nearly 1.2 million t/y. The investment will also almost double the existing workforce at the site, which is currently producing billets to be re-rolled by the company’s other plants in Spain.

When questioned by Kallanish, Celsa said that it had no new information to release on the matter at present.