NLMK Group, a global steel company, says it has introduced the use of polymer materials instead of timber for the transportation of steel semis, for the first time in the history of international commercial shipping. The new transportation scheme saves more than RUB 100 million and 13,000 m3 of timber annually.
Previously, timber was used as lining when transporting metal by sea. Every year, close to 13,000 m3 of timber, or almost three railway trains, would be used for this purpose. In the new scheme, timber is replaced with reusable fasteners made from special polymer materials.
Now, 20 times less timber is required for shipping a batch of metal. At the same time, there is no need to recycle used timber, whereas demand for recycling household plastic waste into polymer material is incentivized. 50,000 1.5-liter plastic bottles are needed to produce new polymer fasteners for transporting a 5,000-tonne batch of slabs. The new fasteners are easy to use, accelerating the process of loading steel semis onto a ship.
The new transportation scheme is now being used on the Kaliningrad – Frederiksværk (Denmark) route. The scheme will be scaled up within the NLMK Group supply chain.
NLMK Group is the largest steelmaker in Russia and one of the most efficient in the world.
NLMK Group’s steel products are used in various industries, from construction and machine building to the manufacturing of power-generation equipment and offshore wind turbines.
NLMK operates production facilities in Russia, Europe and the United States. The Company’s steel production capacity exceeds 17 million tonnes per year.
NLMK has a highly competitive competitive cash cost among global manufacturers and one of the highest profitability levels in the industry. In 12M 2019, the Company generated $10.6 bn in revenue and $2.6 bn in EBITDA. Net debt/EBITDA stood at 0.7х. The Company has investment grade credit ratings from S&P, Moody’s, Fitch, and RAEX (Expert RA).
NLMK’s ordinary shares with a 20.7% free-float are traded on the Moscow Stock Exchange (ticker "NLMK") and its global depositary shares are traded on the London Stock Exchange (ticker "NLMK:LI"). The share capital of the Company is divided into 5,993,227,240 shares with a par value of RUB1.