SAIL plans Rs 14,337-cr capacity expansion in FY12

State-run Steel Authority of India (SAIL) plans to invest Rs 14,337 crore for its capacity expansion in its existing five major plants next fiscal.

The proposed outlay is 17% more than Rs 12,254 crore it had estimated to spend on enhancing capacity in the current fiscal, Budget papers for 2011-12 showed.

Out of the proposed capex, a good part (Rs 5,730 crore) would be spent on modernaisation and expansion of Bhilai Steel plant in the terminal year of the 11th Five Year Plan.

SAIL's Rourkela facility would get Rs 2,619 crore, IISCO Rs 2,100 crore, Bokaro Rs 1,700 crore, Durgapur Rs 950 crore and the Salem facility Rs 100 crore among others.

"Major scheme in the outlay is for expansion of Rourkela, Bokaro and IISCO Steel Plants," the Budget papers said, while adding that all these proposed expansions would be funded through internal and extra budgetary resources (IEBR).

In Bhilai, apart from capacity expansion, SAIL proposes a 700 tonne per day (tpd) oxygen plant and rebuilding the Coke Oven battery No. 6.

In Rourkela the company plans to install a 700 tpd oxygen plant and installation of a coke oven gas holder besides increasing capacity.

SAIL has three alloy steel plants at Durgapur, Salem and Bhadravati in Karnataka. It proposes to invest Rs 25 crore in these three facilities next fiscal.

The maharatna firm has 14.35 million tonne per annum installed capacity now. It has already embarked on increasing the capacity to 23.46 million tonne per annum by 2012-13.

Apart from domestic expansion plans, the state-run firm also eyes to set up four plants of 3 million tonne per annum capacity each in Oman, Afganisthan, South Africa and Mongolia with an estimated investment of $12 billion.