History of Cherepovets Metallurgical Combine by years

The construction of a large plant to supply the North-West region of Russia with domestically produced metal became possible after the discovery of Kola iron ores and Pechora coals in 1930-1933. Severe climatic conditions and geographic distance made it inefficient to construct a metallurgical plant in the immediate vicinity of ore and coal deposits. It was decided to locate the enterprise near Cherepovets – at the crossroads of ore, coal and finished product flows and the intersection of the Vologda-Leningrad railway line with the Mariinsky water system.

On June 20, 1940, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution “On the organization of the metallurgical base in the North-West of the USSR”, providing for the establishment of a steel works in Cherepovets. The construction of the plant was postponed due to the Second World War and began seven years later.

On December 30, 1947 it was decided to resume construction of the Cherepovets Steel Works with a revision of the project based on the results of a study of the issues and the recommendations of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.

On August 24, 1955, the first Cherepovets cast iron was produced at blast furnace No. 1. This day marked the birth of the Cherepovets Steel Mill. The blast furnace was functioning on coke imported from the Novo-Lipetsk Steel Mill.

On May 1, 1958, at 1:40 am, the first Cherepovets steel was produced. Later that morning, the still warm ingot was transported around the city in a festive column.

In November 1959, the Government congratulated the builders and metallurgists behind the commissioning of the largest sheet-rolling mill in Europe – 2800 Sheet-Rolling Shop No. 1. Cherepovets mill was capable of operating a full metallurgical cycle. In the following years, new metallurgical facilities were commissioned: blast furnaces, electric furnaces, converters and rolling mills for the production of sheet and shaped steel.

Given the complex structure and combined nature of production, on June 23, 1983, the Ministry of Ferrous Metallurgy of the USSR decided to reorganize the Cherepovets Steel Works as part of the Cherepovets Steel Mill.

On September 24, 1993, in accordance with a decree of the President of the Russian Federation, the state enterprise Cherepovets Steel Mill was registered in the city hall of Cherepovets as Severstal joint-stock company.

Since 1993, Severstal has been actively developing: it now includes enterprises involved in the production of hardware, large-diameter pipes, extraction of coal, iron ore and other minerals.

Over the entire period of its existence, more than 400 million tons of steel have been produced and more than 2,500,000 km of rolled products have been manufactured.