EU-28 Crude Steel Output Rose Marginally by 1.8% in May

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): The EU-28 countries recorded marginal jump in crude steel output during the month of May 2018. The production data published by the World Steel Association (worldsteel) indicates that the European output was up marginally by 1.8% when compared with the same month a year before. The EU-28 crude steel production totaled 14.979 million net tonnes (NT) in May this year, as compared with the output of 14.714 million NT in May 2017. It must be noted that the regional output growth stood lower than the worldwide crude steel output growth of 7% in May this year.

The leading crude steel producer in the region was Germany. The German output surged higher by 2.6% from 3.801 million NT in May 2017 to 3.900 million NT in May this year. Italy-the second largest producer, recorded 3.7% jump in production over the previous year. The production totaled 2.180 million NT in May 2018, as compared with 2.102 million NT during May last year. In third place was Spain with production totaling 1.337 million NT. The combined production by the above three top steel producing EU-28 countries totaled 7.417 million NT, accounting for nearly 50% of the total regional production.

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The other key steel producers in the region were: France (1.333 million NT), Poland (855,000 tonnes), Austria (709,000 tonnes), Belgium (685,000 tonnes) and the Netherlands (624,000 tonnes). Also, Luxembourg reported the highest year-on-year jump in output, witnessing 26.1% growth. The Bulgarian output declined the most, falling by 8.3% when matched with the previous year.

The cumulative production during the first five-months of the year stood marginally higher by 1.8% year-on-year. The Jan-May ’18 production surged higher to 73.069 million NT from 71.785 million NT during the corresponding five months in 2017. The top five crude steel producers during this period were Germany (18.685 Mt), Italy (10.663 Mt), France (6.709 Mt), Spain (6.248 Mt) and Poland (4.357 Mt).