The Hindu Business Line : SAIL plans more coking coal import thru Vizag port

Kolkata, Aug. 8 Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) proposes to step up import of coking coal through Visakhapatnam port in view of difficulties at Haldia and Paradip ports.

Normally the company’s coking coal import through Visakhapatnam caters to the requirement of Bhilai plant; the proposed increase is intended to meet the requirements of its other steel plants located at Rourkela, Durgapur and Bokaro, it is learnt. Generally, Rourkela plant is served by Paradip and Bokaro and Durgapur plants by Haldia.

In a normal situation, three rakes of imported coking coal a day on an average are loaded at the Visakhapatnam port for Bhilai plant; the plan now is to step up loading by at least 50 per cent to load 4.5 rakes day, if not more, to meet the requirements of other plants.

Higher loading

Inquiries suggest that the East Coast Railway that serves Visakhapatnam port will have no problems in making available additional rakes to facilitate increased loading at the port. The port authorities too, it is learnt, are geared to handle additional volumes of imported coking coal on SAIL account. “We can handle up to six rakes a day if the situation so warrants,” port sources said.

SAIL, according to original estimate, is to import more than 13 million tonnes of coking coal through the ports of Haldia, Paradip and Visakhapatnam in the current fiscal as against 10 mt in 2006-07.

An estimated 60 per cent of the import, i.e. about eight mt, is to be handled by way of two-port operation, i.e. Paradip and Haldia – 2.5 mt at Paradip and 5.5 mt at Haldia. The rest is to be handled at Visakhapatnam port.

In the first four months of the current fiscal, the total import has been around 2.98 mt – about 1.18 mt at Visakhapatnam, 1.53 mt at Haldia and 0.27 mt at Paradip. The shortfall from the target, it is estimated, has been more than one mt.

One reason for this of course is the delayed arrival of imports because of the problems at the loading port in Australia. But then the problems at the unloading ports of Paradip and Haldia too are no less critical.

For over a month now, Paradip has been hit by acute congestion. The bad weather in the past few days only added to the crisis. The problem at Paradip also contributes to the problem at Haldia because of the two-port operation.

The poor navigability of the Hooghly river prevents big bulk carriers with full load to call at Haldia. The carriers therefore first unload at Paradip and then come to Haldia. Since Paradip is out of bounds for most ships now, Haldia too cannot handle these ships.

Coastal movement

SAIL, it is further learnt, is exploring the possibility of coastal movement of imported coking coal between Visakhapatnam and Haldia.

The essence of the plan is this: big bulk carriers with full load will call at Visakhapatnam port and discharge part of the load to smaller vessels (requiring lower draft) which will call at Haldia for the second round of discharge.

However, the economics of this ship-to-ship operation involving multiple handling is still to be worked out, it is learnt.

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