The Hindu Business Line : SAIL holding 4.5 lakh tonnes imported coal at Vizag, Haldia, Paradip ports

Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) is currently holding a stock of about 4.5 lakh tonnes of imported coal at Visakhapatnam, Haldia and Paradip ports. Of this, the stock position at Visakhapatnam is the largest with more than three lakh tonnes, followed by Haldia 1.24 lakh tonnes, and Paradip 21,000 tonnes. At Paradip, there was no coal stock on SAIL account for two weeks till May 21, it is learnt.

Bhilai plant

“At Visakhapatnam, it should be possible to load up to five to six rakes a day subject to the availability of rakes and the supporting facilities at the port,” according to SAIL sources.

“However, that has not been possible.” And SAIL’s Bhilai plant, which depends almost entirely on coal imported through Visakhapatnam port, is virtually living hand-to-mouth.

The Bhilai plant’s daily requirement of imported coal (Australian Hard) is estimated at 7,500 tonnes, while the present stock position is 8,500 tonnes.

Inquiries with the East Coast Railway, responsible for transportation of coal from Visakhapatnam port to Bhilai plant, reveal that against the programmed allotment of 114 rakes for the entire month (May), the railway has so far supplied 93 rakes to SAIL at Visakhapatnam port. That means the satisfaction level is over 80 per cent.

The crux of the problem, as a spokesman for the East Coast Railway points out, is that the bulk of the import is unloaded from ships at one particular berth where there is no full-length railway line.

SAIL, it is suggested, should examine unloading at other points in the port, having the facilities for full rake loading at a time.

“For the past few months, we’ve been insisting on equitable distribution of import over several points but our appeal to SAIL has so far gone unheeded,” the spokesman observes.

Rake allotment

At Haldia, the programmed rake allotment for loading of imported coal on SAIL account in May is 130 rakes, of which 116 rakes have been supplied by the South Eastern Railway so far.

“For the purpose of rail transportation, Haldia is ideally suited for handling coal imports for four of our plants located at Durgapur, Bokaro, Rourkela and Burnpur (IISCO), but the problem at Haldia is that we cannot handle large volumes in large ships due to poor navigability of the Hooghly river,” added SAIL sources.

The programmed allotment for Paradip for the month is 31 rakes, of which 13 have been supplied by the East Coast Railway so far. For two weeks, there was no coal available at the port for loading.

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