Vacuum furnaces: Tata 'committed to Welsh steel'

A £185 million re-building programme of furnace No 4 is due to go ahead next month at the steel giant's Port Talbot plant.
However, site bosses have warned the facility may not be relit immediately if the steel market remains subdued.
Jon Ferriman, hub director of operations at Port Talbot, said Tata was committed to steel production in Wales.
"The possibility we may not relight No 4 immediately following completion of the rebuild in no way affects the project itself," he said.
Our commitment to giving steelmaking in Wales the strongest possible future remains undiminished.
"By the end of this year Port Talbot will have two state-of-the-art blast furnaces equipped with enhanced safety and environmental features. The rebuilt furnace will be capable of producing larger volumes of hot metal more reliably over the course of a long 20-year campaign life."
Tata said preparations are "on schedule" to start the 125-day project in early July.
A concurrent £53 million project to install a new cooling system in Tata's Basic Oxygen Steelmaking plant will also go ahead as planned.
Tata employs around 7,500 people in Wales. Its Port Talbot facility is one of its key plants in Europe.
Vacuum furnaces are often employed in steelmaking, typically in the heat treatment of steel alloys. Steel is heated to make it strong and robust.
Henrik Adam, Tata Steel's chief commercial officer, said any decision about when to restart No 4 would take the state of the European steel markets into account.
"We have been fortunate in being able to schedule the rebuild project during a period of relatively subdued demand, but we are conscious that there is likely to be a continuing need to stabilise the market once the rebuild is complete," he said.