China's major steelmaker Shougang said it plans to halt its main steelmaking operations in the Shijingshan district of Beijing by Dec 31, Reuters reported.
The main facilities include ironmaking workshops, coking plants, steelmaking workshops and high-speed wire rod mills, which produced 3.3 million tons of crude steel and 2.4 million tons of finished steel products for the first three quarters of this year, it said in a filing to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange on Dec 3.
The company's parent Shougang Group, China's sixth-largest steel mill, has already started testing operations at its first-stage steel plant with an annual capacity of 9.7 million tons in Caofeidian on the coast near Beijing.
Tangshan Steel, a major unit of the country's top steelmaker Hebei Steel Group, holds a 49 percent stake in Shougang Jingtang Iron & Steel, which operates the Caofeidian project, with Shougang holding the remaining stake.
China has encouraged companies to build new integrated steel capacities in coastal areas to produce high-end steel products by taking advantage of ports to minimise the purchasing cost of iron ore, a key ingredient of steelmaking.
Shougang will only keep running a wire rod rolling mill with an annual capacity of 500,000 tons and a 1.5 million ton-per-year cold rolling mill in Beijing, the company added.
