Cleveland-Cliffs Butler Works GOES Expansion, Lyndora, Pennsylvania

The Cleveland-Cliffs Butler Works GOES expansion is a furnace swap with national stakes. Butler Works, in Lyndora, Pennsylvania, is the only U.S. producer of grain-oriented electrical steel, the specialty sheet that goes into the cores of power transformers. Cliffs says the project will raise GOES output by up to 25% and finish in early 2028. On Oct. 6, 2026, the company walked Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Commerce and Energy officials through the work.

The price tag depends on who’s counting. Cliffs now describes a $200 million investment in Butler Works. In April, the Pittsburgh Business Times put the electrification project at $170 million. The difference likely reflects the “other infrastructure improvements” Cliffs has folded into the current figure, but the company hasn’t broken it out.

Project Scope

The core of the job is new induction reheat furnaces, built by Cliffs in Warren, Ohio. Earlier reporting described four induction units replacing two natural gas-fired furnaces, which electrifies slab reheating ahead of the hot strip mill. Cliffs expects more efficient heating, fewer production losses, better steel quality and lower emissions from hot rolling.

This is brownfield work inside a running mill with about 1,200 employees represented by UAW Local 3303. Cliffs expects roughly 220 construction workers at peak, drawn from local union building trades. No engineer or general contractor has been named publicly.

The money behind it has survived one political test already. The Department of Energy’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations awarded $75 million under the Biden administration, and the grant came through DOE’s 2025 project review after the change in administration. CEO Lourenco Goncalves said in April that the project “remains on schedule for 2028 completion.”

Why It Matters

Transformer lead times have stretched to years as utilities, data center developers and generators all compete for the same equipment. A transformer can’t be built without GOES, and the U.S. has exactly one domestic source. Adding a quarter more capacity at Butler won’t close the import gap on its own, but it’s the cheapest lever available: no new plant, no new site, just faster and cleaner reheating at a mill that already knows the product.

It also matters for Butler itself. Reporting earlier this year tied the electrification investment to keeping the plant open at all, after Cliffs had weighed its future a few years ago. A 2028 finish would make the mill a better fit for the grid buildout now under way.

Project Team & Details