| FORT WAYNE, INDIANA, November 20, 2006 — Steel Dynamics, Inc.
(NASDAQ: STLD) today announced that it has decided to discontinue the
participation of its wholly-owned subsidiary, Ferrous Resources LLC, in
the development and construction of a commercial iron nugget plant at
Hoyt Lakes, Minnesota. This four year old “Mesabi Nugget” joint venture
project with four other participants — IronUnits LLC (Cleveland Cliffs),
Kobe Iron Nugget LLC (Kobe Steel), Ferrometrics, Inc. and Iron Range
Resources, an agency of the State of Minnesota — built and operated a
pilot plant at Silver Bay, Minnesota to validate Kobe’s ITmk3 iron
nugget technology and has been involved in negotiations over the past
several years to build a large scale demonstration plant as the next
phase in the commercialization of the technology.
In announcing its decision to suspend its current financial
involvement and participation in the project, Mark Millett, Steel
Dynamics’ Vice President, stated: “While we are pleased that our efforts
and those of the other participants in this project to date have
established the merits of the iron nugget technology and have confirmed
that a large scale demonstration plant could be constructed to produce
commercial quality iron nuggets in sufficient quantity; we and our joint
venture partners have simply not been able to conclude definitive
agreements to fully address all of the many operating and financial
issues that require resolution prior to our further commitment of time
and resources to the project. We will continue to explore opportunities
to use Kobe’s ITmk3 process in another project as and when circumstances
change.”
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