The Department of Trade and Industry said Thursday it endorsed the 500,000-metric ton section mill of SteelAsia Lemery Works Inc. in Lemery, Batangas for faster approval under the Green Lane program.
The Board of Investments, the investment promotion agency of the DTI, awarded the Green Lane certificate of endorsement to SteelAsia chairman and chief executive Benjamin Yao on Sept. 15, 2023.
“Green Lane will be very helpful to the company. We consider it as a ‘win’ for the country and we will convert this privilege into action,” said Yao.
Yao committed to supporting the goals of developing more infrastructure projects.
SteelAsia is spending P19.3 billion for the establishment of the Lemery plant, with the 500 MT section mill representing a major component of the facility.
The project is expected to start operating by July 2024 and employ 600 personnel and workers from the Lemery and nearby areas.
The plant, which follows a greenfield design, will commission the first sections of production that include the state-of-the-art hot-rolling production line with an upstream integrated recycling-based steelmaking.
The Lemery plant will be the country’s first steel beam manufacturing facility, with a capacity of producing 1.1 million tons of steel products annually.
It will use the state-of-the-art electric arc furnace (EAF) technology to refine steel which will be used to hot-roll steel sections such as H-beams, I-beams, I-channels and unequal leg angle bars.
Asia’s largest steel conglomerate has several ongoing projects that will buttress its position as the foremost manufacturer and supplier of steel in the region.
Aside from Lemery Works, SteelAsia is also looking forward for the commissioning of the Candelaria Works in Quezon province and Concepcion Works in Tarlac province.
Supporting the company’s integrated steel manufacturing activities is SteelAsia’s network of facilities composed of Meycauyan Works in Bulacan, Calaca Works inside the Calaca Industrial Seaport in Batangas, Carcar Works and Compostela Works in Cebu, Davao works in Bunauan District in Davao City and Villanueva Works which houses SteelAsia’s atest technology called M6 that can process up to 250,000 metric tons of rear annually.
Local steel manufacturing reduces the country’s dependence on imported steel products.