Dommeldange

[2] Since the 17th century, Dommeldange was a metal production site under the Ancien Régime, using charcoal from the nearby Grünewald and obtaining ore from sediment deposits from surrounding lands, which were heated in kilns.[3] From 1845, the Metz family of businessmen and industrialists, started to set up blast furnaces and foundries in the neighbouring district of Eich, where they were to experiment with using coke and oolite iron ore with a high phosphorus content, known as minette.[4] The fact that the forge masters had access to an experienced workforce, inhabiting the nearby areas of Weimerskirch, Beggen, Walferdange, Eich and Muhlenbach, was probably helpful in the decision to establish the works in Dommeldange rather than Esch-sur-Alzette.[4] The Dommeldange factory generated substantial profits in the years 1868–1873, which allowed the Metz & Cie directors to finance the construction of a second large iron works, this time in the heart of the mining basin, in Esch-sur-Alzette.[4] The high phosphorus content of minette caused problems, a technical difficulty which risked becoming a question of life and death for the steel industry of Luxembourg and Lorraine.Together with the inventor and with the German metallurgist Joseph Massenez, Jean Meyer, chief scientist at the Dommeldange works, subsequently proceeded to empirically analyse the first tests of the Thomas procedure in Europe.[8] The goals of the decisive redevelopment of the steelworks of Dommeldange, implemented after the turn of the century by the engineer Emile Bian, were therefore the specialisation of the manufacturing process and the modernisation of the production works.