The Hindu Business Line : BHEL Tiruchi received orders worth Rs 7,700 cr last fiscal

Tiruchi April 4 BHEL's Tiruchi unit, which manufactures boilers for power plants, received record inflow of orders last year, worth Rs 7,700 crore. Thanks to this, the unit opens the year 2007-08, with an outstanding order book worth Rs 11,650 crore.

The value of orders booked last year was more than double that of the previous year, a reflection of the growth in power sector. Orders received included about Rs 440 crore for renovation and modernisation jobs and Rs 410 crore for spares.

Mr R.N. Misra, Group General Manager, BHEL Tiruchirapalli Complex, told journalists here on Wednesday that the Tiruchi unit had given a proposal for expansion to the company's board of directors. He did not want to disclose the quantum of investments, but said that the board would take a decision this month.

This would be the second phase of expansion. The first phase (Rs 190 crore) is under way.

The expansion plan will raise the capacity of the Tiruchi unit, the largest of all the company's units, from about 4,000 MW to across 10,000 MW. (Although the unit's nameplate capacity is 4,000 MW today, Mr Misra said that the actual capacity, including the job got done by ancillaries, was about 5,300 MW. The expansion would then mean a doubling of the unit's production capability.)

Last year's turnover of the Tiruchi unit was Rs 4,575 crore, up 30 per cent from Rs 3,536 crore in the previous year. The unit processed 3.84 lakh tonnes of steel compared with 3.29 lakh tonnes in the previous year.

For BHEL, Tiruchi, whose boilers run 65 per cent of the country's installed power capacity of 1.25 lakh MW, the next major strides expected are securing an order for the high-value super critical boilers and a foray in the nuclear power sector.

In the supercritical area, BHEL, which partnered with NTPC for the lost bids for the two Ultra Mega Power Projects (Sasan and Mudra), is hoping to get an order from NTPC for the 2x660 MW Barh project. It is also bidding for 2x800 MW Krishnapatnam project of APGENCO and 5x800 MW Ultra Mega Power project also at Krishnapatnam.

As regards a foray into nuclear power, Mr Misra said that BHEL was ready to supply boilers for 700 MW nuclear plants. But for higher capacities, it would need to gain access to technology. Once the plans of Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd's were clear, BHEL would act accordingly, he said.