LIBERTY Galati has today announced that it will restart its Blast Furnace No.5 after a short stop. This is on the back of healthy demand for our plate and coated products. The restart will commence in the coming days and follows a meeting with LIBERTY Steel Group Executive Chairman, Mr. Sanjeev Gupta, and the Romanian Deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Marian Neacsu, in Bucharest yesterday.

The meeting covered Galati’s imminent restart plans to serve local customers in infrastructure and shipbuilding, and LIBERTY’s plans for investment in green steel in Romania.

The company requested the government support related to the CO2 certificates allocation and the existing incentives for energy intensive consumers. During the discussion, the Vice Prime Minister underlined the importance of Galati steel mill for the Romanian economy and the need to continue the investments for decarbonization. The Romanian Government will work with the company to identify the solutions to support the restart of the blast furnace.

With the business now in a more stable position the restart of Blast Furnace No.5 will help to exploit the advantages the business has in supply of plate and coated products to our customers that includes critical infrastructure projects in Romania and across Europe.

LIBERTY Galati is a standalone ringfenced business, unaffected by the issues faced by its sister plant in Ostrava.

Speaking after the meeting in Bucharest, Ajay Aggarwal, LIBERTY Galati’s Chairman of the Board, said:

“The last twelve months have been extremely challenging for the steel industry across Europe, but we’re encouraged by the support we’ve been shown by the Romanian Government.

We’re grateful to be working in partnership with the Romanian Government to navigate these challenges and to support the essential role Galati plays in producing vital steel products for critical infrastructure, and in providing high quality employment to thousands of people.

With the restart of Blast Furnace No.5 we plan to exploit our key advantages in our product portfolio, such as plate and coated material, and build momentum for the market recovery we all hope to see in Europe.”