Cleveland-Cliffs Middletown steel plant

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Cleveland-Cliffs Middletown steel plant, also known as Middletown Works, AK Steel Middletown, is a steel plant in Middletown, Ohio, United States that operates blast furnace (BF), basic oxygen furnace (BOF), and direct reduced iron (DRI) technology.

Location

The map below shows the exact location of the plant in Middletown, Ohio, United States:

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• Location: 1801 Crawford St., Middletown, OH 45043, United States
• Coordinates (WGS 84): 39.488589, -84.386197 (exact)

Background

The Cleveland-Cliffs Middletown steel plant began operations in 1901 under the company AK Steel. The steel plant was acquired by Cleveland Cliffs in 2020 when the company bought AK Steel for $3 billion.

Low-emissions/green steelmaking

This steel plant is associated with a green steel project tracked in the Green Steel Tracker. Details about the project are included below.

Table 1: Green Steel Project Details

All references for the above data are available in the Green Steel Tracker.

	Project 1
Project name	Phase 1: Hydrogen-Ready Direct Reduced Iron Plant and Electric Melting Furnace Installation
Company	Cleveland-Cliffs
Company has climate goals?	Yes
Location	Middletown, OH, United States
Project website	Site
Project scale	Demo
Project status	Announced
Year to be online	2026
Technology to be used	H-DRI + EAF
Technology details	Hydrogen-Ready Direct Reduced Iron Plant and Electric Melting Furnace Installation project for iron and steelmaking
Iron production capacity (million tonnes per year)	2
Steel production capacity (million tonnes per year)	3
CO2 capture (million tonnes CO2 per year)	Not applicable
Hydrogen generation capacity (MW)	Not applicable
Investment size (m USD)	500
Date of announcement	2024-09-16

Plant Details

Table 2: General Plant Details

Start date	Workforce size
1901	2363

Table 3: Ownership and Parent Company Information

Parent company	Parent company PermID	Parent company GEM ID	Owner	Owner company PermID	Owner company GEM ID
Cleveland-Cliffs Inc	4295903753	E100001000649	Cleveland-Cliffs Inc	4295903753	E100001000649

Table 4: Process and Products

Steel product category	Steel products	Steel sector end users	ISO 14001	Main production equipment
semi-finished, finished rolled	cold rolled, hot rolled	automotive, building and infrastructure, tools and machinery, transport	2022	BF; DRI; BOF

Table 5: Plant-level Crude Steel Production Capacities (thousand tonnes per annum)

¹Please see our Frequently Asked Questions page for an explanation of the different capacity operating statuses.

Capacity operating status1	Basic oxygen furnace steelmaking capacity	Nominal crude steel capacity (total)
operating	2722	2722

Table 6: Plant-level Crude Iron Production Capacities (thousand tonnes per annum)

¹Please see our Frequently Asked Questions page for an explanation of the different capacity operating statuses.

Capacity operating status1	Blast furnace capacity	Sponge iron/DRI capacity	Nominal iron capacity (total)
announced	–	2500	2500
operating pre-retirement	2090	–	2090

Table 7: Upstream Products Production Capacities (thousand tonnes per annum)

Sinter	Coke	Pellets
NF	>0	NF

Table 8: Actual Plant-level Crude Steel Production by Year (thousand tonnes per annum)

Year	BOF production	Other/unknown steel production	Total (all routes)
2019	unknown	unknown	–
2020	3000	–	3000
2021	2018	–	2018
2022	1973	–	1973
2023	2028	–	2028

Table 9: Actual Plant-level Crude Iron Production by Year (thousand tonnes per annum)

Year	BF production	Total (all routes)
2019	1998	1998
2020	1892	1892
2021	1850	1850
2022	2100	2100
2023	1900	1900

Unit Details

Table 10: Blast Furnace Details

Unit name	Status	Start date	Current size	Current capacity (ttpa)	Decarbonization technology	Most recent relining
BF 3	operating pre-retirement	1953	1493.0	2090	In May 2023, Cleveland-Cliffs successfully completed the first-ever hydrogen injection trial in the Americas region at its this blast furnace	2021

Table 11: Direct Reduced Iron Furnace Details

Unit name	Status	Announced date	Start date	Current capacity (ttpa)
unknown DRI (1)	announced	2024-03	2029	2500

Table 12: Basic Oxygen Furnace Details

Unit name	Status	Start date	Current capacity (ttpa)	Current size
BOF 15	operating	2017	1361	169.0 m3
BOF 16	operating	2021	1361	169.0 m3

Articles and Resources

Additional data

To access additional data, including an interactive map of steel power plants, a downloadable dataset, and summary data, please visit the Global Iron and Steel Tracker on the Global Energy Monitor website.

Resources

• Company website
• Wikipedia