SAIL to begin iron ore production from Chiria by 2014

Thursday, 01 Sep 2011

BS reported that Steel Authority of India Limited would start producing iron ore from the Chiria mines in the West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand by 2014.

As per report, SAIL is set to finalize an investment roadmap for the project following completion of the detailed project report next month.

SAIL had appointed Hatch Associates of Australia as consultant for preparing Chiria’s project report, which would be submitted soon. It plans to develop the mine with an initial capacity of 7 million tonnes per annum to be subsequently expanded to 15 million tonnes per annum in the coming years

Mr CS Verma chairman of SAIL told Business Standard that “We are fully dependent on Chiria for all our future expansions. The mine will be a lifeline for SAIL as reserves in other mines we have been operating deplete. The mine will become operational in the next three years with likely investment of INR 3,500 crore.”

Mr Verma said that “More than 40% of the iron ore requirement of 100 million tonne would be met from Chiria.”

Chiria, with proven reserves of over 1.8 billion tonne is one of the largest iron ore mines in Asia. While environment clearance for the mine was already in place, the environment ministry accorded the forest clearance to the BSE listed company earlier this year.

SAIL produces 14.5 million tonne steel annually now but it’s iron ore requirement is set to grow from 25 million tonne at present to 100 million tonne by 2020 as production capacity expands to 60 million tonne over this period.

sourced BS