Aluminium major Nalco today laid the foundation stone to set up a ₹ 131-crore alloy wire rod manufacturing facility to address the rising demand of the power sector, particularly in power transmission.
The foundation stone for the new facility, being set up at Nalco’s smelter plant at Angul, was laid by Union Mines Secretary Anil Mukim through video conferencing at a function held here.
“The upcoming alloy wire rod manufacturing facility, to be set up at a cost of about Rs 131 crore, will have an installed capacity of 40,000 TPY (Alloy Grade) /60,000 TPY (EC Grade),” said an official of the Navaratna firm.
Congratulating Nalco for its performance in the first quarter of this fiscal, Mukim said the aluminium major has become the pride of India in non-ferrous sector and the cost focus of management has made Nalco recognised as the lowest cost producer of alumina in the world.
He said the result orientation and value creation by Nalco management was also highly impressive.
Mukim was referring to Nalco clocking a profit after tax of ₹ 687 crore in the first quarter against ₹ 257 crore in Q4 of previous year, registering a growth of 167 per cent .
As compared to the corresponding quarter of last year, the growth in net profit has jumped by a whopping 433 per cent, from ₹ 129 crore to ₹ 687 crore. Similarly, the company has recorded an increase of 10.74 per cent and 8.85 per cent in alumina and aluminium production respectively in the Q1 period of 2018-19.
Tapan Kumar Chand, CMD of Nalco said the per capita aluminium consumption in India is only 2.2 kg against a world average of 7 kg and 20 kg in China.
“Our country is set to witness a quantum jump in aluminium consumption in next 2 to 3 years,” he said.
Besides, various initiatives like Smart cities, bullet trains, power to every household, energy efficient automobile, aluminium wagons would further give boost to consumption of aluminium in the country from existing level of 3.2 million tonnes per annum to 8 million tonnes per annum, said Chand.