Indian state-run steelmaker Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) will expand the capacity of its Rourkela Steel Plant (RSP) to 9 million mt per year, from 4.4 million mt per year at present, entailing an investment of $3.45 billion, director-in-charge of RSP, Alok Verma, said in a statement on Monday, March 17.
Following the expansion, to be completed across 1,200 acres at the existing steel mill located in the eastern state of Odisha, RSP will account for 25 per cent to SAIL’s total steel output of 35 million mt per year by 2030, Verma said. He noted that RSP was set up in the 1950s with German collaboration with an initial capacity of one million mt per year.
“With the expansion, we aim to garner a sizeable share of the sectors which we cater to,” Verma said.
He pointed out that RSP produces plates, hot rolled (HR) coils, spiral welded and electric resistance welded pipes, cold rolled non-oriented (CRNO) which find applications in areas like ship building, rail wagons, LPG cylinders, automobiles, oil and gas, motors, generators, and transformers.
The plant also has a dedicated mill to manufacture naval grade, armour grade and quenched and tempered plates for various naval and defence applications.
The expansion will also include a raw material handling plant, a coke oven stamp charge battery, a sinter plant, thin slab caster-direct rolling, a cold rolling mill, a silicon mill and logistics.
Besides, a new blast furnace and steel melting shop will be set up, Verma added.