OREANDA-NEWS. Turkish steelmaker Icdas is looking for offers from Chinese construction companies to build a 2,800m? blast furnace in Cannakale, Turkey. The plant would have a nameplate capacity of 2mn t/yr of hot metal.

Icdas is still seeking a construction firm for the turnkey project. It has recently asked Turkey's environment ministry to extend the consultation period, having initially sought planning permission from the ministry in December 2013.

The pig iron from the plant will reduce Icdas's demand for merchant pig iron and its demand for ferrous scrap, market participants said. Icdas's current crude steel output will be unaffected.

Alongside the blast furnace, Icdas is planning to build a 3mn t/yr sinter plant, a 500,000 t/yr pelletising plant, and a 1mn t/yr capacity coke oven.

The blast furnace project includes a power plant utilising captured offgas, according to an environmental impact assessment document sent by Icdas to the environment ministry. The construction period will last two years, and is set to cost TRL2bn (\\$800mn).

The plan envisages raw material consumption of up to 4mn t/yr of iron ore, 1.5mn t/yr of coking coal, 1mn t/yr of petroleum coke, and 400,000 t/yr of anthracite.

Several other integrated production projects are also being considered by other Turkish steelmakers. A number of strategic factors are influencing the investment decisions. Large Turkish steel mills require substantial volumes of scrap as feedstock.

Turkish producers have become increasingly reliant on ferrous scrap supplies from Europe, the Baltics and North America, despite government-sponsored attempts to boost domestic scrap generation.

Meanwhile, short-sea ferrous scrap supply from the Balkans, Russia and Ukraine has been steadily declining since the middle of the last decade, increasing Turkish producers' exposure to domestic EU and US scrap price movements.

Turkish steelmakers have expressed concern about increasing competition from regional integrated competitors which currently benefit from a comparatively lower cost of production.