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| Edited By: Supriya Ghorpade |Source: DNA |Updated: Mar 18, 2018, 02:39 AM IST
Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL), which runs Vishakapatnam Steel Plant, is planning to form a joint venture with the Karnataka government to set up a three million tonne steel plant in the state at an investment of around Rs15,000 crore.
The company is also looking to tie up with National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) to mine iron ore, beneficiate and pelletise it in the state.
However, Pradip Kumar Bishnoi, chairman and managing director of RINL, said both plans were still in the initial stages and would take some time to take off.
He said the state-owned company was considering utilising the existing facilities of Kudremukh Iron Ore Company Ltd (KIOCL) for its steel plant in the state.
But that, he said, would require clearances from government as the KIOCL plant has been shuttered for about five years now on Supreme Court orders.
KIOCL has some fine dumps of iron ore which it has not used and RINL is planning to utilise it. KIOCL also owns a pellet plant at Mangalore, which the Vizag steelmaker is keen on running.
Bishnoi, however, clarified that his company was not looking at any mining activity in the Kudremukh area and would seek mining rights at a place to be granted by the state in the event of the project taking off.
He said that the company would be setting up a four million tonne capacity special products plant at its Vizag plant, investing about Rs25,000 crore by 2015.
“The process of setting up of this plant has begun. Consultants have already been appointed. Report should be in place within two or three months,” Bishnoi said.
A P Choudhary, director - projects - RINL, said, “These (new) units will have state-of-the-art technologies for better quality and cleaner end-products. As a result of this, a whole new range of products will be made available to the end-users for the first time in the country.” He said hitherto RINL had been producing long products and wanted to enter the area of manufacturing flat products like seamless tubes of larger diameter of 200 to 300 metres, used by oil field, gas distribution and boiler tube industry.
It would also roll out cold-rolled non-grain oriented and cold-rolled grain oriented products at the proposed plant, for which it was scouting for technical know-how, he said.
