U.S. STEEL GOING QUIET
U.S. Steel, which occupies most of Zug Island, a heavily industrialized island at the mouth of the River Rouge on the Detroit River, announced Friday it is shutting down steelmaking operations. Zug Island is the suspected source of the Windsor Hum.
While it is economically devastating news for the Detroit area, it’s good news environmentally for residents on both sides of the border that U.S. Steel Corp. has announced it will “indefinitely” shut down all steelmaking operations at its Great Lakes Works facility on Zug Island and along the riverfront in Ecorse.
It could also potentially mean the end of the Windsor Hum, the low rumbling sound that has plagued Windsor’s west end for years and which some people believe originates at a blast furnace on Zug Island.
“The company expects to begin idling the iron and steelmaking facilities on or around April 1, 2020, and the Hot Strip Mill rolling facility before the end of 2020,” U.S. Steel said in a press release.
The company is calling it a business decision and — just days before Christmas — indicated it will hand out more than 1,500 layoff notices to workers at its Detroit-area operations, “although we anticipate the final number of employees who will be impacted by the idling will be lower.”
A company spokeswoman indicated Friday the current number of employees at Great Lakes Works is 1,644 as of Wednesday.
So, all that will remain for the foreseeable future will be a skeleton staff on duty to handle some remaining work at the facility — based on customer demand — that will include what’s known as the Pickle Line, Cold Mill, Sheet Temper Mill, Continuous Galvanizing Line (CGL), Annealing and warehousing.
But the company plans to transfer all steel making to its facility in Gary, Ind., known as Gary Works.
“In order to further accelerate our strategy of creating a world-competitive ‘best of both’ U.S. Steel, we must make deliberate, but difficult operational decisions,” said David Burritt, the company’s president and CEO.
The company in August already announced it was idling for the remainder of the year one of its two blast furnaces — the B2 blast furnace — on Zug Island for upgrades and due to a steep decline in the demand for steel.
“One blast furnace was shutdown this summer,” said company spokeswoman Amanda Malkowski. “The other is expected to be idled on or around the April 1 impact date.”
Environmental issues aside, a large majority of the facility’s workforce will soon be without a job.
“Transitioning production currently at Great Lakes Works to Gary Works will enable increased efficiency in the use of our assets,” Burritt said. “We are conscious of the impact this decision will have on our employees, their families and the local community.
“We are announcing it now to provide them with as much time as possible to prepare for this transition. These decisions are never easy, nor are they taken lightly. However, we must responsibly manage our resources while also strengthening our company’s long-term future.”
A Canadian study a few years ago pointed to Zug Island as the primary source for the controversial Windsor Hum that for years has disrupted the lives and sleep of countless local residents — primarily in west Windsor and Lasalle.
West-end resident, Mike Provost, who for years has tracked daily noise levels and vibrations related to the Windsor Hum, was hopeful, but also skeptical on Friday that such a large company as U.S. Steel and operations in Detroit will actually fully shut down, despite the announcement.
“I still feel antsy,” he said. “With so many employees and equipment involved, I just can’t see them doing this. There are a lot of politics involved here with tariffs on steel.
When those tariffs disappear, are they going to jump back in and start everything up all over again?
“I’d certainly love to see (the hum) go away. We have been dealing with this for a very long time.”
A Star investigation earlier this year also illustrated how U.S. Steel Great Lakes Works has been listed as having “high-priority violations” every quarter annually for the last three years, according to enforcement and compliance records by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The status of operations have also been listed “non-compliant” since the start of 2016.
As concerns ramp up globally about climate change, the area steel producer has been identified for pumping out a blend of chemicals that, aside from particulate matter and carbon monoxide, include benzene, mercury, methane, formaldehyde and arsenic.
U.S. Steel took over operations at the steel facility on the riverfront in 2003, but the massive black blast furnaces — easily visible from Windsor — date back to the early 1900s when they were the largest of their kind.
Steel-related operations on Detroit’s riverfront have for too long been a “significant contributor of local transboundary air pollution,” said Derek Coronado, executive director of the Citizens Environment Alliance in Windsor.
“For years, you can find black soot and dust on vehicles and that’s just the stuff you can see,” he said. “What’s an even greater impact on air quality is the stuff you can’t see — things such as carbon monoxide, particulate matter and benzine.
“My family has a working-class background, so losing these jobs, as dirty and dangerous they may be, that’s a big blow and my heart goes out to the community. But when companies get into trouble, the first thing to be shuttered are often these type of facilities not up to date or considered weaker (within a corporation).”
Malkowski said there were no “specific references” regarding either the facility’s age or negative environmental footprint during the company’s decision to close down Great Lakes Works.
But she pointed to a major announcement made by U.S. Steel a month ago that unveiled the company’s goal to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by 20 per cent by 2030.
A focus of that plan is a Us$280-million investment into developing electric-arc-furnace steelmaking at the company’s Fairfield Works plant in Alabama. Electric-arc-furnace steelmaking relies on scrap recycling to produce new steel products.
The company’s Big River Steel facility in Arkansas has also been recognized as the first Leed-certified steel mill in the U.S.