Dofasco Inc

Dofasco Inc

Dofasco Inc, a Canadian-owned, non-union company, has its principal steel mills and head office in Hamilton, Ontario. Dofasco is Canada's second largest steel producer. In 1996 Dofasco produced 3.7 million tons of steel and had sales of $2.8 billion, and the company employed about 7000 people. Its main products are hot-rolled, cold-rolled, galvanized, Galvalume, tinplate, chromium-coated and prepainted steels. Dofasco receives its ore from Newfoundland and Québec, its coal from the US, and its flux (Limestone, dolomite, lime) from Beachville, Ontario. Dofasco is noted for its early adoption of new technologies. Also, it is hailed for its enlightened approach to employee relations.

Major Facilities

Dofasco's two blast furnaces convert Iron Ore into impure liquid iron, and this iron is fed, along with scrap, into one K-OBM (Klöckner Stahl GmbH, Basic Oxygen Process type vessel with bottom oxygen blowing) that converts the iron and scrap into liquid steel. One two-strand continuous caster then solidifies the liquid steel into slabs. To balance its steelmaking capacity with its downstream rolling and coating facilities, Dofasco is constructing an electric arc furnace (scrap-based steelmaking operation) and a second slab caster.

Dofasco's 68-inch, 7-stand, hot-strip mill rolls low-carbon steel slabs into hot-rolled strip. Its cold mill complex - a coupled acid pickling line and tandem cold rolling mill - cleans and rolls the hot-rolled strip to thinner cold-rolled strip. This unit has 1.2 million ton capacity. In addition, three cold rolling mills (66-inch reversing mill, 56-inch 5-stand, and 72-inch 5-stand) roll hot-rolled to finished cold-rolled steel. Three electrolytic tinning lines, four continuous galvanizing lines (one capable of producing Galvalume ) coat the steel. Hot- and cold-rolled, coated and uncoated ("black") steels are widely used in the Food and Beverage, Automotive and Construction industries.

Subsidiaries

Dofasco's subsidiaries and joint ventures manufacture a variety of steel products: Prudential Steel Ltd, Calgary, Alta, makes tubular steel products; Baycoat Limited, Stoney Creek, Ont, prepaints steel strip; DNN Galvanizing Corporation, Windsor, Ont, galvanizes sheet; Ferrum Inc, Brampton, Ont, produces hollow structural tubing (HSS) and oil country tubular goods; and Sorevco Inc, Coteau-du-Lac, Qué, galvanizes flat-rolled steel.

In 1995 Gallatin Steel in Kentucky (50% partnership) - Dofasco's first steel plant in the US - began operations. It employs the latest thin-slab casting technology and it can produce up to 1.2 million tons of hot-rolled steel annually.

See also Iron and Steel Industry.