Hyundai’s planned $5.8 billion steel mill in Ascension Parish is one of the biggest industrial projects Louisiana has landed in years.
Under development in the RiverPlex MegaPark near Donaldsonville, the facility will be the South Korean automaker’s first North American steel plant. It’s expected to create 1,300 permanent jobs and produce 2.7 million metric tons of steel annually, largely for Hyundai and Kia factories in Alabama and Georgia. First steel is targeted for 2029.
Ascension Business Report recently sat down with Hyundai executives “Charles” Chul Soon Jang and Hyo Joon Park to discuss how the project is shaping up. Below are five quick insights from that meeting.
The workforce challenge may be the project’s biggest hurdle.
Hyundai executives were blunt about one issue: Ascension does not currently have a ready-made steel workforce. That’s why Hyundai and River Parishes Community College have partnered to launch a training center in Donaldsonville designed to feed locals into steel-focused tracks. One executive acknowledged that Ascension will see “a lot of Koreans coming in” until the operation is stable, at which point newly trained locals will begin replacing them.
Construction could feel like a small city setting up shop.
The permanent job count is big, but the construction job count is bigger. Executives said the buildout will involve 4,800 construction workers, and they noted that CF Industries is working on its own multibillion-dollar project right next door, bringing in hundreds more. Traffic is a concern, as is housing. Asked directly about worker lodging or a possible “man camp” setup, executives said they expect much of the housing demand to be met by the local market rather than by Hyundai itself.
Hyundai talks a lot about hydrogen, but natural gas comes first.
The plant would be better described as “hydrogen ready” than hydrogen powered, at least at launch. Executives said they ultimately want to use hydrogen in production but made it clear that they will start out using natural gas, as hydrogen is not yet available at a competitive price. The hydrogen story is real, but it’s a future-facing strategy, not a day-one reality.
Hyundai’s presence is already being felt in the community.
Though the project is still years away from operation, Hyundai’s local presence is already becoming a story of its own. Executives have been making themselves unusually accessible for a project of this scale, meeting regularly with residents in Donaldsonville and Modeste. A handful of Korean restaurants are going up in the area, and one executive was even made king of a Donaldsonville Mardi Gras parade.
Ascension won the project because of logistics, logistics, logistics.
Why Ascension? Hyundai’s answer was straightforward: The parish gives the company a rare combination of river access, rail connectivity and proximity to its Southern auto factories. The plant will import 3.6 million metric tons of raw materials per year and will rely heavily on rail to move finished product.
