Power has been urgently restored at Arrium’s Whyalla site, minimising what was expected to be a loss of up to $30 million, following last week’s South Australian blackout.
The ABC reports that the steelworks are now running at about 80 per cent capacity, and have had 40 MW of grid power urgently restored. Some power was available over the weekend.
The predicted cost of the production stoppage was put as high as $30 million, though is now likely to be around $10 million, said administrator Mark Mentha of KordaMentha. .
“We as administrators are doing our darnedest to mitigate the cost, but also with the Government’s help restore business back to normal operations,” he told the ABC.
“Tom Koutsantonis, the Treasurer here, has made Arrium his number one priority outside of domestic or health needs.”
The plant currently produces around 30 MW of power from waste gases, and it uses 60 MW at peak usage.
The Australian reported this morning that the administrator is in negotiations with the SA government and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation to upgrade the site’s boiler and to have the site run independently of the SA grid. Natural gas would be used as a backup power source.
The September 28 storms led to a complete blackout in the state. Sites including BHP’s Olympic Dam, and the Prominent Hill copper and gold mine are still affected.
Arrium went into administration in April, owing $4 billion.