India's crude steel capacity to rise to 120 million tonnes by 2012

India's crude steel capacity to rise to 120 million tonnes by 2012.
 
Total crude steel production capacity in India is expected to go up to around 120 million tonnes by December 2012 from the current level of around 72.9 million tonnes, official estimates based on the progress of steel capacity expansion projects showed.
As per provisional data released by the World Steel Association (WSA), India was the fourth largest producer of crude steel as of January-September 2010. India's crude steel production capacity stood at 50.1 million tonnes as of January-September 2009 against China's 474 million tonnes, Japan's of 81.9 million tonnes and USA's crude steel capacity of 60.9 million tonnes. However, a relative position in the world scenario would depend upon the prevailing conditions in other steel producing and consuming countries, which is not possible to forecast, the steel ministry said in a release. As far as the technology, operation methods and type of products are concerned, the details of these are decided by the individual companies based upon techno-commercial considerations, the release said. Besides capacity addition plans by private sector companies, public sector Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) and Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL) too are in the process of expanding their crude steel capacities, the release said. SAIL plans to invest around Rs70,000 crore to increase its crude steel production capacity from the existing 12.84 million tonnes to 21.40 million tonnes per annum in the first phase of expansion, to be completed by 2012-13. RINL will be investing Rs12,228 crore to expand its annual steel production capacity to 6.3 million tonnes by December 2011, from the existing 2.9 million tonnes. NMDC Ltd, another public sector company, is setting up a 3 million tonnes per annum integrated steel plant at Nagarnar, Chhattisgarh, at an estimated cost of Rs15,525 crore. The plant is likely to be commissioned in 2014, the release said.
 
Steel Authority of India Limited is implementing a capacity expansion project for IISCO, in West Bengal that will see its crude production capacity increase to 2.50 million tonnes from the current 0.5 million tonnes. The project is slated for commissioning by June 2011.
 
SAIL is also raising capacity of most of its other plants. Under the programme, the capacity of Salem Steel Plant in Tamil Nadu has been raised to 1.2 lakh tonnes by June 2010.
 
Bokaro Steel Ltd is increasing annual capacity at Jharkhand to 4.61 million tonnes from the current 4.36 million tonnes, by December 2011.
 
Bhilai Steel Plant at Chhattisgarh is almost doubling its capacity to 7 million tonnes by March 2013 from the current 3.93 million tonnes. Rourkela Steel Plant at Orissa plans to hike annual crude steel production capacity to 4.20 million tonnes by March 13 from the current 1.90 million tonnes. Crude capacity at SAIL's Durgapur Steel Plant in West Bengal will go up to 2.20 million tonnes by December 2012 from the current 1.80 million tonnes. The current modernisation and expansion programme of Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) envisages an increase in the present hot metal production from 14.6 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) to 23.46 million tonnes per annum by 2012-13. The increase in production capacity is expected to increase the average power requirement of SAIL steel plants and mines from the present 1000 MW to 1900 MW after completion of the modernisation and expansion programme. Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd will more than double crude steel capacity at Visakhaptanam in Andhra Pradesh to 6.3 million tonnes in the first phase by March 2011 from 3 million tonnes at present. NMDC Ltd is setting up a 3 million tonne facility at Nagarnar in Chhattisgarh, to be completed in 42 months from the receipt of all statutory clearance and approvals and placement of orders for major technological packages.