A little warm glow returns

A little warm glow returns

The prospect that the skies south of Warren may soon be lighted by the glow of steel and coke production is enough to warm the heart of any Mahoning Valley native.

Everyone knows that the best days of the Steel Valley are behind us. Many of the plants that once produced thousands of tons of steel simply don’t exist anymore. Still, it was painful to know that the Severstal Steel plant, formerly WCI Steel, and ArcelorMittal’s Warren coke plant, which had provided coke for Severstal, weren’t producing enough heat to metal the winter’s snow.

Last week, USW officials said Severstal, which has about 1,300 idle employees, is going back into production, but company officials were noncommittal.

A restart of the coke plant, which has about 125 employees, was confirmed, but isn’t necessarily tied to Severstal’s fate, because ArcelorMittal could ship all of the plant’s products to ArcelorMittal plants in Cleveland.

Do tariffs play a part?

Free traders and their counterparts — be they fair traders or protectionists — will argue over whether the Obama administration’s tighter reins on steel imports get any credit. It’s too early, really, to say.

But it’s not too early to say that it’s a good thing to have American workers producing steel on American soil (even if they’re in the employ of foreign owners). Once a steel plant or coke oven is allowed to lie fallow for too long, once its machinery is sold-off or cannibalized, that plant is gone forever.

Meanwhile, officials of two local pipe producers, V&M Star Steel and Wheatland Tube, leave no doubt that they believe U.S. International Trade Commission tariffs on Chinese imports of oil-country tubular goods will help them increase domestic production. They believe an even stronger case can be made that China is dumping its pipe on the U.S. market at less than it costs to produce. If proven, that would bring higher tariffs.