Illinois Business Journal Illinois Business Journal
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Booming global demand, weak dollar shift steel makers into high gear
By ALAN J. ORTBALS

   While bleak news of an economic recession comes across the airwaves almost daily, U.S. Steel’s stock has nearly doubled in the past 12 months and the company set a sales record in the first quarter of 2008.
   At its Granite City plant, work is under way on a $570 million capital investment program that will add new coke ovens and a cogeneration plant. And, Alton Steel has gone to three shifts, boosted its workforce to 324 with plans to add more. What’s going on? The American steel industry is booming, and with it Southwestern

. Imports of foreign steel have dropped dramatically because of strong worldwide demand and the low value of the dollar. American steel manufacturers are surging to meet domestic needs. Photo courtesy of The Associated Press.
Illinois’ steel manufacturers.
   Once written off as a dying business, the American steel industry is now running full bore trying to keep up with demand, according to Mike Fitch, president and chief executive officer of Alton Steel Inc.
   “One of the big drivers is that about 130 million tons of steel is consumed annually in the United States for all types of uses: the automotive industry, road construction, building construction, home construction, washing machines, etc.,” Fitch said. “The United States’ steel manufacturing capability is about 100 million tons per year, so you’ve got a [continue]

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Technology enables Wood River Refinery to benefit from oil sands

. . By KERRY L. SMITH

   Steady research and development, coupled with an ever-increasing demand for oil, is spurring companies such as ConocoPhillips (Wood River Refinery) to tap into once unreachable reserves in a remote area of Canada.
   Known as the oil sands or “tar sands” due to the heaviness of the crude contained within them, at least 174 billion barrels worth (10 percent) of this enormous oil reserve is now considered to be economically recoverable. Matt Fox,

senior vice president of oil sands at ConocoPhillips’ Canadian headquarters in Alberta, says it’s a resource second in size only to Saudi Arabia.
   Fox heads up the company’s oil sands division, including the Surmont project, which is ConocoPhillips’ first operational project in the oil sands effort. Phase I began [continue]

Growing number of levees in the St. Louis area raises concern
By ALAN J. ORTBALS

   When the Pin Oak levee broke near Winfield, Mo. on June 27, it flooded thousands of acres of farmland and dropped the predicted flood level at St. Louis by two feet.
   Such is the impact of levees on other areas, according to some area planners. Despite this fact, there is no coordinated plan to handle floodwaters in the St. Louis metro area and no single organization that [continue]

 . Scientists say that the levee building boom that has occurred in the St. Louis area since the great flood of 1993 leads to higher, faster floodwaters moving with greater destructive power, endangering other areas. Photo courtesy of The Associated Press.