Walbridge broke ground in May 2013 on the new Benteler Steel Tube Manufacturing Facility in Shreveport, La. It will be the German steel company’s first facility in the United States. With design partners SSOE, Middough and Siemens, Walbridge is developing a 360-acre greenfield site for the project under a design-build-at-risk contract.
The project includes all facility construction for an 800,000-square-foot tube rolling and finishing mill, an administration building, a central maintenance lab and warehouse building, billet storage area, and all related electrical and mechanical utility buildings. The team is also installing all onsite roads and railroad lines for the new facility.
The project is expected to create more than 1,000 construction and supplier jobs and an estimated 675 full-time jobs once the facility is in full operation, according to Benteler’s website. The finished mill will be capable of producing up to 320,000 tons of steel tubes annually.