EXHIBIT 99.1

Report of Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm

To the Participants and Plan Administrator of the
     Northshore Mining Company and Silver Bay Power Company
     Retirement Savings Plan

We have audited to accompanying statement of net assets available for benefits of the Northshore Mining Company and Silver Bay Power Company Retirement Savings Plan as of December 31, 2003 and the related statement of changes in net assets available for benefits for the year ended December 31, 2003. These financial statements are the responsibility of the Plan’s management. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these financial statements based on our audit.

We conducted our audit in accordance with the standards of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (United States). Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement. We were not engaged to perform an audit of the Plan’s internal control over financial reporting. Our audit included consideration of internal control over financial reporting as a basis for designing audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances, but not for the purpose of expressing an opinion on the effectiveness of the Plan’s internal control over financial reporting. Accordingly, we express no such opinion. An audit also includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements, assessing the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by management, and evaluating the overall financial statement presentation. We believe that our audit provides a reasonable basis for our opinion.

In our opinion, the financial statements referred to above present fairly, in all material respects, the net assets available for benefits of the Plan at December 31, 2003 and the changes in its net assets available for benefits for the year ended December 31, 2003, in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles.

/s/ ERNST & YOUNG

June 25, 2004