U.S.A. refractories market is segmented by product type (shaped, unshaped, insulating, and functional refractories), refractory chemistry or mineral (magnesia, alumina, silica, doloma, zirconia, chromite, silicon carbide, and carbon), alkalinity (basic, acidic, and neutral), end-user industry (iron and steel, cement and lime, aluminium, glass, energy, and foundry), and specific iron and steel applications (ironmaking, primary steelmaking, secondary steelmaking, continuous casting, and downstream processing).

Market Decipher estimates that US refractory consumption will reach about USD 2.7 billion in 2026 and climb to roughly USD 3.5 billion by 2036, a compound annual growth rate of around 2.7%. Our bottom-up range for 2026 is USD 2.4–3.0 billion, depending on how installation materials and engineered services are counted. Refractories are the bricks, castables, gunning and ramming mixes, insulating products and flow-control parts that keep furnaces, ladles, kilns, reactors and heaters intact above 1,200°C. They are consumed, not owned. Linings wear out in days (ladles and tundishes) or years (blast furnaces and glass tanks), so spend follows how hard American plants are run, and only secondarily how many plants exist. On our build-up, steel accounts for close to half of US value. Cement, glass, aluminium and other non-ferrous metals, refining and petrochemicals, power generation, foundries and lime make up the balance.
2026 is the year the US stopped moving with the rest of the developed world. Cumulative raw steel output reached 70.2 million net tons by the week ending 26 September, up 5.3% on 2025, with capacity utilisation at 79.1% against 77.2% a year earlier (AISI). That puts the country on course for roughly 93–94 million net tons for the year. Global crude steel production, by comparison, slipped 0.7% in the first half. Protected, better-paid and better-utilised steelmaking is the single most important fact about American refractories today, because every additional heat through a ladle brings the next relining closer.
The recovery is narrow. Steel and aluminium are pulling refractory demand forward; glass is shrinking; cement is only beginning to recover; and the high-margin, project-type work in glass, non-ferrous and industrial applications is still stalled. RHI Magnesita’s first-half filing counts total industrial project numbers at roughly 40% below historic averages and glass project revenue down 40% in constant currency. The US market therefore rewards suppliers who are strong in steel and in service contracts, and punishes those who relied on a project rebound.
Three structural forces now matter more than the cycle. The supplier base is consolidating, with a 551-pence-per-share approach from RHI Magnesita for Vesuvius live until 27 October. Production is moving next to the customer, through acquisitions, recycling joint ventures and new plants. And the US still imports most of its refractory-grade magnesia, so trade policy is effectively a raw-material price. The sourcing, footprint and contracting choices made over the next 18–24 months will fix competitive positions for most of the forecast period.
Demand Catalysts Through 2036
Protected steel with real earnings behind it. Section 232 duties were restructured on 6 April 2026 so that articles made almost wholly of steel, aluminium or copper pay 50% on full customs value, while some metal-heavy derivatives moved to a temporary 25% through the end of 2027. Steel imports fell 25% year on year in March (1.77 million net tons, AIST). The effect shows up in customers’ accounts: Nucor’s second-quarter EBITDA was about USD 2.0 billion on record mill shipments, Steel Dynamics shipped a record 3.7 million tons, and Nippon Steel lifted its fiscal 2026 profit outlook for U.S. Steel from JPY 100 billion to JPY 180 billion. Mills that earn this kind of margin run furnaces harder, relocate maintenance windows less often and can absorb the price increases that suppliers are now pushing through.
A relining and restart cycle that is visible in the capital plans. U.S. Steel returned Gary Works blast furnace No. 14, its largest, to service in September after a USD 350 million reline, restarted Granite City’s blast furnace B after more than two years, and is carrying a USD 1.9 billion direct-reduction plant at Big River and up to USD 2.5 billion of Mon Valley upgrades under Nippon Steel’s USD 11 billion commitment to 2028. Each of these is both a one-off purchase and a signal that the integrated base will operate into the 2030s. Market Decipher expects relining and restart work to lift lumpy, high-value shaped-product and monolithic demand in 2026–2028 in a way that weekly steel output figures understate.
Greenfield and brownfield capacity entering its first lining campaigns. Nucor’s West Virginia sheet mill (roughly USD 4 billion) is commissioning through 2026 with commercial shipments scheduled from early 2027 and a ramp that runs through 2028. Hyundai Steel held its Louisiana groundbreaking on 4–5 September. Steel Dynamics is ramping a 650,000-tonne aluminium flat-rolled mill in Mississippi. Century restarted more than 50,000 tonnes of idled capacity at Mt. Holly, South Carolina, with full production targeted by the end of June. We see the supplier qualification for these assets, not the steel price, as the decisive commercial event of the next three years: the firm that is specified for the first fill usually keeps the maintenance campaigns that follow.
Energy, refining and power heaters that favour lightweight insulation. HWI, a Calderys company, opened a greenfield lightweight monolithics plant in Fulton, Missouri in March 2026 with a dedicated furnace, robotic packaging and captive clay supply, aimed at refinery, petrochemical and power-generation heaters and at make-to-stock availability. Insulating products are the quiet growth segment of the US market because they are sold on fuel savings, which is a more reliable buying argument than output volume.
Cement climbing off a low base. US cement shipments including imports reached 39.5 million tons in the first five months of 2026, up 4%, and clinker output was up 7.3% to 19.8 million tons in January–April. Spring forecasts from the American Cement Association had a 2.5% fall for the year before a summer update raised the outlook and judged that volumes had bottomed. Data-centre construction is the supportive end-market; housing remains the drag. Kiln linings follow clinker output, so this is a modest tailwind that Market Decipher expects to build in 2027–2028 as rate relief arrives.
Circular raw materials as a cost and supply lever. RHI Magnesita holds 51% of BPI, a Pittsburgh-based processor with seven recycling facilities, and the group recycling rate rose to 19.5% in the first half of 2026 from 15.7%. Spent linings are a domestic raw-material source that grows in step with steel output. We expect recycling capacity, rather than mining, to be the main route by which US producers reduce import exposure through 2036.
Friction Points and Disruptions
An import-dependent mineral base. Net import reliance for magnesium compounds was 59% in 2025 (USGS). Roughly four-fifths of US magnesium compound consumption goes to non-refractory uses such as environmental, de-icing and chemical applications, so the refractory slice of the domestic market is small and heavily supplied from abroad. Imports of dead-burned and fused magnesia come 69% from China and 17% from Brazil (2021–24 average). In the first eight months of 2025, imports from China of caustic-calcined magnesia rose 66% to 201,000 tons and dead-burned and fused magnesia rose 9% to 77,200 tons. Chinese magnesite mining is consolidating hard: Liaoning’s operators fell from 114 in 2020 to 63 in 2024, with 56 expected by end-2025. Output controls are enforced, yet RHI Magnesita reports they have not lifted prices for refractory-relevant grades, while fused magnesia, dead-burned magnesia, alumina and resin prices still rose in the first half of 2026.
A tariff regime rewritten three times in eight months. The Supreme Court struck down IEEPA tariffs on 20 February; a 10% Section 122 surcharge ran from 24 February until it expired on 24 July; and new Section 301 duties of 10–12.5% on 60 economies replaced it that day. Brazil, a key magnesia source, has faced a further 25% Section 301 duty since 22 July, subject to HTS-level exclusions that importers must check line by line. Goods covered by Section 232 are carved out of the new 301 layer, but refractory bricks and monolithics are not steel derivatives. Refractory buyers and sellers cannot treat landed cost as a stable input.
A trade-remedy decision on magnesia-carbon bricks. The US International Trade Commission opened third five-year reviews of the countervailing duty order on Chinese magnesia-carbon bricks and the antidumping orders on Chinese and Mexican bricks on 1 July 2026. Responses were due 31 July and comments on adequacy 8 September. The orders have been in force since 2010 and survived two earlier expedited reviews. Our base case is continuation, which would keep the largest consumable in converters, electric arc furnaces and ladle slag lines protected through the early 2030s. The decision date is a planning milestone for every importer and domestic brick maker.
Gulf-conflict cost inflation. The conflict that began on 28 February pushed up freight, energy and raw-material costs. RHI Magnesita booked EUR 28 million of unplanned cost increases in the first half, including EUR 11 million of transport and about EUR 10 million of raw materials, and had not passed all of it through by 30 June. The Congressional Research Service noted in March that US natural gas prices stayed comparatively flat while Asian and European prices jumped. That gap helps explain why US steel is competitive and why local refractory producers carry less energy risk than European rivals.
Execution risk is now visible in the numbers. Vesuvius’s results attribute about GBP 6 million of first-half profit loss to operating problems in North American flow control and in India, and acknowledge share losses in flow control and advanced refractories during the period. RHI Magnesita’s May ERP go-live in the US created shipping and invoicing backlogs, and receivables rose EUR 39 million year on year. In a market where steel output is up 5%, neither of the two largest suppliers reported volume growth that matched it; RHI Magnesita’s own filing says its North American volumes lagged the market because of phasing. Reliability of supply, not demand, is the scarce commodity.
Project-driven end-markets still stalled. More than EUR 50 million of RHI Magnesita’s industrial project revenue has been pushed beyond 2026. O-I Glass cut its 2026 adjusted EBITDA outlook to USD 1.0–1.1 billion from USD 1.25–1.3 billion, Anchor Glass is closing its Warner Robins, Georgia plant (168 employees), and other container producers have trimmed US capacity. Closures remove campaigns; rebuilds concentrate spend. O-I has pointed to accelerated furnace rebuilds and a new furnace starting in the third quarter, and Anchor has committed new capital to rebuilds, so glass refractory demand is thinner but more specification-driven.
Eight Shifts Redefining Value in US Refractories
We read the 2026 evidence as eight shifts. Each ends with the commercial consequence we draw from it.
1. Price has returned; volume has not. RHI Magnesita’s North American gross margin rose to 28.3% from 27.3% as steel customers accepted price adaptations that recover raw-material, freight, energy and labour inflation, while average revenue per tonne stayed flat across the region and group volumes fell 2.7%. Adjusted EBITA margin at group level rose to 10.3% from 8.4%. Consequence: in the US, profit is being made in contract structure and mix, and a supplier that only chases tonnage is mispricing its own risk.
2. A share gap opened in the first half. US steel output rose 6.3% in the first half (worldsteel), and the two global leaders’ US volumes did not keep pace. Minerals Technologies reported 7% growth in its high-temperature product line on US steel demand, and HWI, Allied Mineral Products and Chinese-owned US plants all have capacity. We cannot attribute the gap to individual rivals, but we expect second-tier and regional producers to have taken part of it. Consequence: customer retention in 2026 was an execution test, and procurement teams now hold fresh data on alternative suppliers.
3. Consolidation is heading for its decisive month. RHI Magnesita’s proposals for Vesuvius began at 448 pence in cash on 29 September 2025, moved through a 550-pence proposal that the Vesuvius board rejected on 29 June, and reached 551 pence on 27 August 2026 as 470 pence in cash plus 0.28 new RHI shares for every ten Vesuvius shares. Cevian, with about 23% of Vesuvius, has given an irrevocable undertaking to support a recommended offer, and Vesuvius shareholders would own about 13% of the enlarged group. Under UK rules RHI must announce a firm offer or step back by 27 October. Gustavo Franco takes over from Stefan Borgas as RHI Magnesita’s chief executive on 1 November. Consequence: a combined group would pair the largest basic refractory franchise with the leading steel flow-control franchise in a US steel industry that buys both. We expect competition review in the US and Europe to focus on ladle and tundish flow control, and we expect large steelmakers to respond by qualifying second sources before a deal closes.
4. Local-for-local is becoming local-for-raw-materials. RHI Magnesita acquired Resco (seven US refractory plants, two mineral sites, plus UK and Canadian plants) in January 2025 and took 51% of BPI in 2025; Imerys closed its acquisition of Great Lakes Minerals in Wurtland, Kentucky on 1 June 2026, adding calcined bauxite, mullite and fused alumina processing on the Ohio River with a USD 80 million revenue target; HWI opened Fulton; and Puyang built a US brick plant with 20,000 tonnes of design capacity, which it has said was in part to avoid American antidumping duties. Consequence: the duty regime and the tariff stack are directly shaping where product is made. Footprint is now a trade-policy decision.
5. DRI plus EAF is reshaping the chemistry mix. Hyundai Steel’s Louisiana mill, Big River’s direct-reduction plant and the electric arc furnaces coming into service pair iron-making and steel-making in one site. That favours alumina-based and alumino-silicate systems in shafts and ladles, magnesia-carbon in slag lines, and high-wear monolithics for electric furnace roofs and delta sections, over conventional blast furnace and BOF packages. Consequence: suppliers whose US portfolio is concentrated in basic bricks for integrated mills need an alumina and monolithics answer. This is the logic behind the Resco purchase.
6. Robots and data are the new price lever. Vesuvius booked four flow-control and three advanced-refractory robotics orders in the first half, compared with one and two a year earlier, and RHI Magnesita’s EUR 100 million digital infrastructure programme is about two-thirds complete. Automation shortens relines, makes quality repeatable and reduces the exposure of scarce skilled labour. A potential new Section 232 tariff on industrial machinery and robotics deserves a place on every supplier’s risk register. Consequence: performance-based contracts priced on campaign life and uptime, rather than on bricks by the tonne, are the commercial endpoint of the digital investment.
7. Non-steel segments are diverging, not recovering together. Aluminium has a policy-backed build-out (a 750,000-tonne smelter project, a 50,000-tonne restart, a 650,000-tonne rolling mill) that touches pot linings, casthouses and remelt furnaces. Cement is improving. Glass is in contraction with pockets of rebuild work. Petrochemical heater demand favours lightweight monolithics. Consequence: a single end-market assumption is the wrong planning tool for non-steel revenue. We would forecast each by its own capital cycle.
8. Buyer power is rising with buyer profits. Refractories are about 2–3% of a steelmaker’s operating cost, but a breakout at a caster or a ladle failure costs far more than the lining saved. Buyers with record earnings can afford to pay for reliability and want to buy outcomes, yet they also have the leverage to push dual sourcing and local content. Consequence: the suppliers best placed to hold pricing are those that can put contractual performance guarantees against service quality, safety and delivery.
Value Chain: From Mine to Furnace Lining
Raw materials. Domestic magnesia is largely seawater and brine based, from California, Delaware, Michigan and Utah, and magnesite is mined by one company in Nevada. Refractory-grade dead-burned and fused magnesia is predominantly imported from China and Brazil, with Brazil, home to RHI Magnesita’s Brumado magnesite operation, the second-largest source. Aluminosilicates come from Resco’s fireclay mining in Ohio and pyrophyllite-andalusite in North Carolina, while calcined bauxite, mullite and fused alumina are processed in Kentucky by Imerys Great Lakes. Graphite, silicon carbide and petroleum coke for carbon-bonded products are largely sourced from Asia. Recycled refractory material, through BPI and similar operations, is the fastest-growing domestic stream.
Manufacturing. Global groups (RHI Magnesita, Calderys with HWI, Vesuvius, Saint-Gobain, Imerys, Krosaki Harima, Shinagawa) operate beside American specialists (Allied Mineral Products, Plibrico, Magneco/Metrel, Morgan Advanced Materials, Minerals Technologies) and a growing set of Chinese-owned US plants. Margins are highest in engineered monolithics and flow control, and lowest in commodity bricks where import and duty questions dominate.
Systems and services. Flow-control parts, robotic handling and gunning systems, thermal imaging and installation sit between the plant and the furnace. In-furnace repair and relining specialists carry a large share of the labour. This layer is where consolidation logic is strongest, because customers want a single accountable supplier for ladle-to-mould performance.
Customers and end of life. Steel producers buy through annual tenders and increasingly multi-year performance agreements. Aluminium, cement, glass and petrochemical customers buy mostly by project and campaign. End-of-life material is recycled back into aggregates, new refractories or foundry sand, and the economics of that stream improve as virgin imports become more expensive.
Segment-wise Analysis
By Product Type
Shaped products still make up the largest share of US value, led by magnesia-carbon bricks in converters, electric arc furnaces and ladle slag lines, and high-alumina bricks in ladles and kiln zones. This is the segment where trade remedies bite hardest and where import substitution through local plants is most visible. Monolithics (castables, gunning mixes, ramming mass) are gaining in the electric-furnace and DRI environment and in heater and boiler linings, because installation robots and gunning systems shorten outages. Insulating refractories, including HWI’s GREENLITE range, are growing fastest on energy-saving arguments. Functional flow-control products (slide-gate plates, nozzles, shrouds, stoppers) are a small part of spend and earn the highest margins; they are the area where the proposed RHI–Vesuvius combination matters most.
By Refractory Chemistry
Magnesia is the largest chemistry but the most exposed to import and tariff risk. Alumina and alumino-silicate systems are the growth chemistry on the back of electric-furnace, DRI and heater applications, and the Resco and Great Lakes Minerals transactions show where capital is going. Silica and doloma are mature niches tied to coke ovens, glass crowns and clean-steel practice. Zirconia and fused-cast products serve glass tanks and are tied to the rebuild cycle. Chromite continues to give way to chrome-free formulations. Silicon carbide and carbon-bonded products face supply concentration in Asia and higher petroleum coke costs.
By Alkalinity
Basic refractories (magnesia, doloma, magnesia-carbon) dominate steelmaking and cement kilns. They carry the tariff and trade-remedy exposure and are most sensitive to Chinese magnesite policy. Acidic products (silica, fireclay, zircon) serve coke ovens, glass and ceramics and track the glass cycle. Neutral products (alumina, chromite, carbon, silicon carbide) benefit most from the move to electric and DRI-based steelmaking.
By End-User Industry
Iron and steel is the anchor, supported by Section 232 protection and a heavy capital programme. Cement and lime are recovering, with Texas, California, Florida and Missouri at the centre of production. Aluminium and other non-ferrous metals are the most policy-driven growth case, with a new smelter, restarts and recycled-aluminium rolling capacity. Glass is shrinking in containers and selectively rebuilding. Energy, refining and petrochemicals favour lightweight monolithics and heater linings. Foundries and ceramics are steady, with foundry consumables benefiting from US industrial reshoring.
Iron and Steel: By Furnace and Process Application
Electric arc furnaces now make roughly 70% of US steel, so ladle metallurgy and electric-furnace slag lines carry most of the volume, while the two integrated producers’ blast furnaces and BOF vessels carry the highest per-event value. Ironmaking is the swing: blast furnace relines (Gary No. 14) are large and lumpy, while DRI shafts and melters at Big River and Louisiana are new categories for linings. Secondary steelmaking, especially ladle furnaces and vacuum degassers, is where performance is measured in heats per campaign, and where reliability gaps have been visible in 2026. Continuous casting is the highest-margin stage and the one most affected by consolidation. Reheating furnaces and downstream processing buy mainly on energy efficiency.
Regional Outlook Within the United States
US refractory demand follows steel and aluminium output, but supply and pricing follow trade policy and local plants. Five clusters carry most of the commercial weight.
Great Lakes and Midwest. The integrated heartland: Indiana alone accounts for about one-fifth of national raw steel output (USGS), and Gary Works, Granite City, Cleveland-Cliffs sites and Ohio mills are the main blast furnace and BOF customers. Gary’s reline and the Mon Valley modernisation make this the most valuable cluster for shaped products and relining services. Supply is also local: HWI’s Missouri and Ohio plants, Resco’s Ohio fireclay operation and Imerys Great Lakes in Kentucky sit within one day of most customers.
Gulf Coast and Mid-South. Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama and Mississippi hold the new capacity: Hyundai Steel in Louisiana, Big River’s DRI plant in Arkansas, Steel Dynamics’ Texas and Mississippi sites, and the petrochemical and refining corridor. It is also the largest cement-consuming region. This is the growth cluster for alumina systems, DRI linings and lightweight monolithics.
Southeast and Appalachia. Nucor’s West Virginia mill, South Carolina’s Mt. Holly smelter, Kentucky’s mineral processing and North Carolina’s pyrophyllite-andalusite deposits make this the build-out and raw-material cluster. First-fill demand and qualification activity peak here from 2026 to 2028.
Pennsylvania and the Northeast. Mon Valley’s up-to-USD 2.5 billion programme, Puyang’s Pennsylvania-based US subsidiary and Pittsburgh-based BPI make this the cluster where consolidation decisions will be felt first.
West, Mountain and Southwest. California cement, Nevada magnesite, Utah brine-based magnesia, Arizona’s Kingman steel melt shop and Oklahoma’s planned smelter are the pieces. It is a smaller steel region, with the cluster’s weight in cement, minerals and the 2027–2029 smelter construction cycle.
Imports, Exports and Trade Remedies
For magnesium compounds, the USGS records 2025 estimated imports of 640 thousand tons (magnesium oxide equivalent), against 496 thousand in 2024, exports of only 60 thousand, domestic production of 400 thousand and apparent consumption of 980 thousand. The refractory segment is a minority of that total, but it is the most import-dependent. Crude magnesite, dead-burned and fused magnesia enter duty-free under normal trade relations; the extra layer comes from the Section 301 and antidumping and countervailing regimes. Mexico and China supply magnesia-carbon bricks under existing orders, and Brazil’s role as the second source of dead-burned and fused magnesia explains why the 22 July Brazil action matters. Exports are small beside imports, at an estimated 60 thousand tons of magnesium compounds in 2025.
Market Decipher’s view is that US trade policy in refractories will be defined less by headline rates than by classification and exclusion detail, and by the endurance of the magnesia-carbon brick orders. Companies should build a standing trade-compliance and landed-cost model for each import route and review it quarterly.
Competitive Landscape and Share Dynamics
The US market has three tiers. At the top are global platforms with raw-material access, flow-control technology and nationwide service: RHI Magnesita (with Resco and BPI), HWI within Calderys, and Vesuvius. In the middle are specialist producers and mineral processors such as Allied Mineral Products, Minerals Technologies, Imerys, Morgan Advanced Materials, Saint-Gobain, Refratechnik, Krosaki Harima and Shinagawa. The third tier is a long tail of regional monolithic makers, installers and traders, plus Chinese-owned plants in the US that are growing because they are inside the tariff wall.
RHI Magnesita is the largest. It reported first-half 2026 revenue of EUR 1,595 million and adjusted EBITA of EUR 165 million, with North America at EUR 416 million of revenue and a gross margin of 28.3%. Net debt was EUR 1,528 million, leverage 2.9 times, and capital expenditure was cut to EUR 115 million, so its capacity to pay for Vesuvius depends heavily on the share component and on deleveraging. Vesuvius reported revenue of GBP 913.7 million, trading profit of GBP 74.0 million and a return on sales of 8.1%, with end markets improving in North America and Japan, a European advanced-refractory footprint review due by the first quarter of 2027, and a guided full-year profit slightly above 2025. Minerals Technologies’ high-temperature line (USD 190 million in the second quarter) is a pure indicator of US steel and foundry demand. HWI’s Fulton plant, Imerys’s Great Lakes acquisition and Puyang’s US plant show that mid-tier players are adding local capacity.
Over the forecast period Market Decipher expects share to migrate toward producers that own or control raw-material streams (including recycling), make products inside the tariff wall, qualify early on greenfield sites and can sell performance rather than product. Commodity-brick producers without a service layer will face margin pressure, and we would expect at least one further US mid-market transaction before 2028.

 Refractories Market Segmentation
Consumption, production, imports and exports for 2026–2036 are segmented as follows.
By Product Type
•    Shaped refractories 
–    Magnesite / magnesia brick
–    Magnesia-carbon brick
–    Dolomite / doloma brick
–    Silica brick
–    Alumina / high-alumina and fireclay brick
–    Zirconia and fused-cast products
–    Chromite / chrome-magnesite brick
–    Silicon carbide and other specialty bricks
•    Unshaped / monolithic refractories 
–    Castables (conventional, low-cement, ultra-low-cement)
–    Ramming and gunning mixes
–    Mortars and coatings
–    Plastic and other monolithics
•    Insulating refractories 
–    Lightweight monolithics and insulating firebrick
–    Ceramic fibre and microporous insulation
•    Functional / flow-control refractories 
–    Slide-gate plates
–    Submerged entry nozzles and ladle shrouds
–    Stopper systems
–    Well blocks and nozzles
By Refractory Chemistry / Mineral
•    Magnesia
•    Alumina / high-alumina and alumino-silicate
•    Silica
•    Doloma
•    Zirconia / zircon
•    Chromite
•    Silicon carbide
•    Carbon / graphite-containing
•    Others
By Alkalinity
•    Basic
•    Acidic
•    Neutral
By End-User Industry
•    Iron and steel
•    Cement and lime
•    Aluminium and other non-ferrous metals
•    Glass
•    Energy, refining and petrochemicals
•    Foundry and ceramics
•    Others
Iron and Steel: By Furnace / Process Application
•    Ironmaking 
–    Blast furnace
–    Direct reduction / DRI shaft and melter
–    Hot-metal transport
•    Primary steelmaking 
–    Basic oxygen furnace
–    Electric arc furnace
–    Induction furnace
•    Secondary steelmaking 
–    Ladle and ladle furnace
–    RH and vacuum degassing
–    Argon-oxygen decarburisation and other refining
•    Continuous casting 
–    Tundish
–    Ladle-to-tundish and tundish-to-mould flow control
–    Submerged entry nozzle, stopper and slide gate
•    Downstream steel processing 
–    Reheating furnace
–    Heat-treatment furnace
–    Other high-temperature processing
By Geography and Trade Route
•    US regions: Great Lakes and Midwest; Gulf Coast and Mid-South; Southeast and Appalachia; Pennsylvania and Northeast; West, Mountain and Southwest
•    Imports by origin: China, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, Europe, India, Japan and Rest of World
•    Exports by destination: Canada, Mexico, Latin America, Europe, Asia Pacific and Rest of World
Key Refractory Manufacturers and Value Chain Companies Covered
Leading producers and suppliers shaping US supply and pricing include, but are not limited to:
•    RHI Magnesita  (Austria / Netherlands; Resco, BPI)
•    Vesuvius  (United Kingdom)
•    Calderys / HWI  (France / United States)
•    Imerys / Imerys Great Lakes  (France / United States)
•    Minerals Technologies  (United States)
•    Allied Mineral Products  (United States)
•    Plibrico, Magneco/Metrel and other US monolithic specialists 
•    Saint-Gobain  (France)
•    Morgan Advanced Materials  (United Kingdom)
•    Refratechnik  (Germany)
•    Krosaki Harima  (Japan)
•    Shinagawa Refractories / Gouda Refractories  (Japan / Netherlands)
•    Puyang Refractories / PRCO America  (China / United States)
•    Fosbel and other installation and in-furnace repair specialists 
•    BPI and other refractory recyclers  (United States)