US President Donald Trump on Monday unveiled India-based Essar Group’s plans to build a massive steel plant in Iowa, with an investment of $15 billion.
The plant will use iron ore from a new mine that the company invested $2.5 billion to build in Minnesota ’s Nashwauk. The mine will produce about 7.5 million tonnes of iron per year and create about 350 jobs in the state, the White House official said, noting that it will be the first new iron mine in the US in 50 years. Trump made the announcement in the Oval Office, with Essar Group co-founder Ravi Ruia and his son, Rewant, by his side. The investment is planned by Mesabi Metallics, a mining and resource development company based in the United States’ Minnesota. it is owned by the Essar Group, with Rewant Ruia serving as its chairman While Mesabi Metallics is a US-based company. Energy Secretary Chris Wright, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, John Jovanovic, chair of the Export-Import Bank, and David Copley, senior director for Global Supply Chain, were among those present at the announcement at the White House. “While I was born in India, I went to high school in New York, college in Boston and did my MBA in California.
I have spent half my life here, so announcing this investment today is… a true homecoming for me,” he said at the Oval Office event.
