Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (Visakhapatnam steel plant) expects 45 per cent hike in volume of production in 2014-15 as the expansion project reaches a critical stage and new units start production, according to Chairman and Managing Director P. Madhusudan.

He was reviewing the performance during 2013-14 and its prospects during the current fiscal at a media conference here on Saturday.

He said the revamping of blast furnace 1 may be completed in a month or so and then revamping of blast furnace 2, sinter plant and converters would be taken up. All these woud add another million tonne to the capacity of the plant.

"We have increased the capacity of the plant from 3 million tonnes to 6.3 million tonnes by spending Rs 11,000 crore or so and we will be spending Rs 4,000 crore on modernising the old units. The capacity would go cross 7 million tonnes then," he said and added that the ultimate vision was to make it a 20-million-tonne steel plant.

Sales turnover

Despite difficult market conditions and lower realisations, he said that RINL could achieve a sales turnover of Rs 13,527 crore during 2013-14, including exports of Rs 750 crore. "During the current financial year, we will also focus on exports with increased output. We have already set up an office in Sri Lanka and we will explore the market there," he said.

He said that the company was introducing pulverised coal injection technology in the three blast furnaces, as it was cost-effective and low-quality coal could also be used. It was trying to develop the iron ore mines allocated to it by the Rajasthan Government at Bhilwara and the mine may become operational in 5-6 years.

Madhusudan said the tendering process was going on with regard to the largest forged wheel plant being set up by RINL at Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh along with the Railways.

In response to a query, Madhusudan said that RINL would make all efforts to develop ancillary units in and around Visakhapatnam and extend a helping hand to the smaller units.

>sarma.rs@thehindu.co.in

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