Indian state-run steel producer Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) has commenced planning for its next phase of expansion to ramp up its installed steelmaking capacity to 50 million mt per year, company sources said on Tuesday, August 10.
The sources said that the expansion program is expected to be finalized within the next 15-18 months and that project work should commence in 2023-24.
SAIL is currently nearing the completion of its ongoing $9.45 billion expansion of steel mills, which would take its total installed capacity to 21.4 million mt per year.
Sources said that the expansion plan will allow a sufficient time gap between undertaking each project module, so that there will be a time gap between two large payments.
As per the contours of the expansion worked out until now, the capacity of SAIL’s Durgapur Steel Plant (DSP) will be increased to 7.5 million mt per year from 2.5 million mt at present, the capacity of Rourkela Steel Plant (RSP) will be increased to 8.8 million mt per year from 3.7 million mt per year, the capacity of Bokaro Steel Plant (BSP) will be raised to 9.5 million mt per year from 5.8 million mt, and the capacity of IISCO Plant will be expanded to 7.3 million mt per year from 3 million mt per year.
Increasing the existing capacity of Bhilai Steel Plant from the current level of 7 million mt has not yet been finalized, but it is possible that it will be ramped up to 14 million mt in the second phase of the planned project, the sources said.