SAIL to set up pellet plant in Jharkhand

Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) has decided to set up a 4-million tonnes-per-annum (mtpa) pellet plant at Gua in Jharkhand to utilise accumulated fines at a cost of Rs 780 crore, a top company official told Business Line .

The turnkey contract for installing the plant is slated to be awarded in May. SAIL has received two bids for the contract. The plant is likely to be operational in 2013.

Currently, Gua mines have 35 million tonnes, largest among all SAIL mines, of accumulated fines and generate fines of around 7 mt a year.

According to sources, for more than a year SAIL was seized of the idea of a pellet plant. Research and Development Centre for Iron and Steel (RDCIS), the R&D unit of SAIL, and Mecon as the consultant had studied relevant issues, such as location of the plant and whether split or single location, in relation to the environment, technology and logistics of carrying fines. Finally, SAIL opted for locating the plant at Gua and not at the nearest steel plant site at Bokaro, the other close option.

The oldest mechanised mine in the country, Gua now extracts nearly a third in hematite grade lumps and the balance in fines.

Gua's current lump production capacity is placed at 2.4 mtpa. Under the gradual expansion plan, undertaken by SAIL, Gua mines capacity is to go up to 3.15 mtpa by the end of this fiscal. By 2014-15, the capacity is slated to move up to 8 mpta including pellets, which are substitutes of lumps.

Gua, now fourth in the pecking order of capacity among the seven mines SAIL's raw material division controls, is planned to catapult to the second slot by 2014-15, and in the post-expansion period to share the top slot with Bolani.

SAIL's raw material division estimates the total capacity of the seven mining areas under its belt at 34.6 mpta by 2014-15. According to the long-term plan, two – Kalta (Orissa) and Chiria (Jharkhand) – of the seven, now operated manually are also to be mechanised.

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