1. Industry challenges

Resumption of steel plants in Luxembourg

Luxembourg, April 20th, 2020,
After a suspension of activity for several of our plants in Luxembourg due to the health crisis linked to Covid-19, our Luxembourg steel sites gradually resumed service from March 30.
Before the restarting, everything has been put in place to allow a resumption of production in maximum security conditions for our employees, in order to meet customer requests and ensure the continuity of local economic activity.

 

Health and safety, our priority!

In February, as soon as the first cases of Covid-19 appeared in Europe, we chose to implement prevention measures suggested by the WHO and the Luxembourg government on our industrial and administrative sites. These measures involved continuous information on the hygiene rules to be adopted in order to avoid any risk of contamination, emphasizing especially social distancing and a rigorous and regular hand washing during the day.

As of March 16, administrative workers adopted homeworking. From March 20, industrial activity was suspended at the Belval, Differdange and Rodange plants due to decisions taken by the governments of Luxembourg, France, Belgium and Germany, leading to a reduction in the labor available below the critical minimum to continue production activities safely.

On March 20, the Belval, Differdange and Rodange sites temporarily closed theirs doors facing this exceptional situation. The same was true for Bissen from March 25 to April 3 and in Dommeldange from March 26 to April 9.

 
During these temporary closings, reinforced procedures have been developed aiming at strengthening health measures on the one hand and distancing measures on the other hand. 

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These new routines were explained by training sessions for employees, a large-scale communication campaign in the plants and each of our employees could pick up their marks at their workstation. Each employee was informed of the attitude to adopt if symptoms appeared or if a high risk of contamination was possible: isolation, quarantine themselves and check their health regularly. The Bissen plant has also set up an e-mail address to answer employees' questions.

 
Scrupulous cleaning at the Belval site, 7000 m2 disinfected thanks to 70 persons within three days.
 

A return to work in optimal conditions

The Differdange and Rodange sites were the first to restart from March 30, quickly followed by Belval on April 2.

Bissen covid

Upon their return, the employees discovered new workstations 2 meters apart from each other, an adjustment to work schedules to prevent teams from crossing paths in the lockers room, a compulsory traffic direction and a new layout in the refectories in order to easily respect the distance. A complete disinfection of the workspaces was carried out by specialized companies for all our sites. Before starting to work, managers make a scrupulous reminder to their team of the new measures to adopt. Finally, dedicated squads were created on the sites to help and check the application of sanitary measures by the teams.

 

 

In Bissen, a traffic direction is formally established to ensure that the distance instructions are respected

Roland Bastian

Roland Bastian, Vice President ArcelorMittal Luxembourg and CEO ArcelorMittal Belval

In Belval, very precise hygiene measures are mandatory for people who wish to enter the facilities, such as truck drivers: wearing a mask and taking a temperature of everybody entering, for example, these operations even more ensuring the safety of our employees. It can be done through a partnership between our internal health, IT, technical development and R&D services at ArcelorMittal Luxembourg.

Rodange covid

Plastic walls have been installed between the workstations in Rodange when the distance instructions are difficult to implement.

Health instructions displayed at numerous points in the facilities:

 

 

Access rules are indicated in places where distancing measures are more difficult to observe (here in Differdange).covid differdange

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covid differdangeIn Differdange, as on all sites, safety measures continue during meal times: employees must maintain the safety distance in the canteens, leaving a chair between them.

 


Complete sanitary materials and products 

Luxembourgish plants distributed products and accessories to the employees to protect their health: surface cleaning and disinfection products, gloves, masks and disposable coveralls and also hydroalcoholic gel to regularly disinfect hands.

 

Masks have also been made compulsory for all our deliverers, visitors and truck drivers.


 

covid gel

In Belval disinfectants for surfaces and hydro-alcoholic gels for disinfecting hands along with disposable gloves and Tyvek suits are distributed from a central location in the plant.

 

Thanks to the efforts of everyone, at all levels of the hierarchy, and the support of the medical team, the restart of activities was able to be carried out under maximum sanitary conditions.

ArcelorMittal in Luxembourg is running to contribute to the country's economic activity and to serve its customers.

 covid tmb back

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Carole Henry

CSR & Communications- ArcelorMittal Luxembourg