Scunthorpe Steelworks is an integrated steel mill with blast furnaces in North Lincolnshire, England. It is owned by the UK government which nationalised the plant in July 2026. As of April 2025, the facility employs around 2,700 people. It is the only steel mill in the UK capable of producing virgin steel, which is used in major construction projects like new buildings and railways. The rest of the UK's steel industry produces recycled steel using electric arc furnaces. The iron and steel industry in Scunthorpe was established in the mid-19th century, following the discovery and exploitation of middle Lias ironstone, east of Scunthorpe (Lincolnshire). Initially, iron ore was exported to iron producers in South Yorkshire. Later, after the construction of the Trent, Ancholme and Grimsby Railway (1860s) gave rail access to the area, local iron production rapidly expanded, using local ironstone and imported coal or coke. The local ore was relatively poor in iron (around 25% average) and high in lime (CaCO3) requiring co-smelting with more acidic silicious iron ores. The growth of industry in the area led to the development of the town of Scunthorpe in a formerly sparsely populated, entirely agricultural area. From the early 1910s to the 1930s, the industry consolidated, with three main ownership concerns formed—the Appleby-Frodingham Steel Company, part of the United Steel Companies; the Redbourn Iron Works, part of Richard Thomas and Company of South Wales (later Richard Thomas and Baldwins); and John Lysaght's Normanby Park works, part of Guest, Keen and Nettlefolds. In 1967, all three works became part of the nationalised British Steel Corporation (BSC), leading to a period of further consolidation—from the 1970s the use of local or regional ironstone diminished, being replaced by imported ore via the Immingham Bulk Terminal—much of the steelworks was re-established with equipment at or south and east of the Appleby-Frodingham works during the late 1960s as part of the Anchor modernisation. Primary iron production was at four blast furnaces first established or expanded in the 1950s, and known as the four Queens: named Queen Anne, Bess, Victoria and Mary. Both the Normanby Park and the Redbourn works were closed by the early 1980s. Conversion to the Linz-Donawitz process (LD) of steel making from the open hearth process took place from the late 1960s onwards, with an intermediate oxygen utilising open hearth process known as the AJAX furnace operated in the interim. Conversion to LD operation was complete by the 1990s. Following privatisation in 1988, the company, together with the rest of BSC, became part of Corus (1999), later Tata Steel Europe (2007). In 2016, the long products division of Tata Steel Europe was sold to Greybull Capital with Scunthorpe as the primary steel production site, under the historic British Steel name. Jingye Group purchased British Steel in 2020. Following the risk of job losses, the Labour party parliament stepped in to take control of the plant from Jingye Group and fully nationalised it in July 2026, protecting its workforce and equipment. Following the closure of the last blast furnace at Port Talbot Steelworks in Wales in September 2024, Scunthorpe Steelworks is the UK's only remaining primary steelmaking facility.
History
Background and geology
It is thought that the iron deposits in Lincolnshire were worked sometime before the 19th and 20th century exploitations—forges at Stowe are mentioned in the Domesday Book, and archaeological evidence has been found of iron working at Scunthorpe. The ironstone in Lincolnshire is thought to have been laid down during the Jurassic period and forms part of a series of ironstones found in eastern England found in the Lias Group of rock strata that also includes ironstone formations making up the Cleveland ironstones and Northamptonshire ironstones; iron deposits in Northern France and Southern Germany may also be from the same period and origin. The Lincolnshire ironstone is found in the Lower Lias band in the Lower Jurassic series/period, it is a nearly horizontal bed, 10 to 25 feet (3.0 to 7.6 m) thick, averaging 12 feet (3.7 m), and consists of calcareous haematite; near the surface the ores are converted to a hydrous form, limonite. The deposit is thought to have been originally created by the deposition by precipitation of Iron(II) containing waters, followed by oxidation via weathering to Iron(III). Characteristic fossils found in the ironstone beds included large ammonites, and gryphaea, cardinia, and other mollusc species. The geological strata in Lincolnshire includes a number of iron bearing rocks including (downwards) the Claxby ironstone (Claxby, Lower Cretaceous period); the Lincoln ironstone; the Caythorpe ironstone (Caythorpe, Middle Lias period), below which is the 'Frodingham Ironstone' once mined at Scunthorpe. At Frodingham the ironstone existed in a bed up to 35 feet (11 m) thick, covered by loose sand. The ore was found in the form of a calcareous hydrated oxide, with some oolitic nodules, much affected by water weathering; local variations within the ore bed included bands with iron content as high as 40%, down to 12%, with an average iron content of 25%, excluding spoil. The ironstone bed dipped slightly towards the east—the bed's proximity to the surface, its fair uniformity, and the general low value of the land on which it stood led to rapid development of open ore workings. The lime content of the ore rendered it self-fluxing, but its high lime content and basic nature were problematic and led to the practice of using it in combination with silica containing ores (for slag formation). Iron produced from the bed including the fossiliferous lime contained over 1% phosphorus, similar to that from the Cleveland ironstone, as well as a few per cent of manganese. Ironstone extraction was almost entirely east of a roughly north–south boundary passing through Scunthorpe between the town and steelworks—this boundary was itself east of the Lower Lias escarpment (Trent Cliff). Iron ore extraction was reduced in the later half of the 20th century, to be substituted by foreign imported ores of better quality.
Establishment of iron ore extraction and smelting (1859–1912)
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