By IANS
Raipur : Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP) recorded its “best ever” performance in 2007-08 in the production of hot metal, crude steel and saleable steel, the plant’s managing director said Friday.
“BSP notched up the best ever performance in just ended fiscal 2007-08, crossing the five million tonne-mark in the production of hot metal as well as in crude steel for the second time,” said R. Ramaraju, managing director.
BSP – the flagship unit of the public sector Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) – crossed the 5 MT hot metal production barrier for the first time in fiscal 2005-06.
“During 2007-08, BSP achieved the best ever annual production of 5.268 MT hot metal, 5.054 MT crude steel and 4.427 MT saleable steel. This works out to 112.4 percent, 129 percent and 140 percent of rated capacity respectively,” Ramaraju told reporters at an annual conference at Bhilai, 30 km from here.
He added: “BSP surpassed its previous best performance by a good margin. While all previous records of finished rails and plates, merchant products and wire rods production have been smashed, a significant achievement in 2007-08 was the quantum jump in the production of value added special steel products and development of new product grades.”
Ramaraju said that nearly two decades after its last expansion to 4 MT, 2007-08 also saw the ground getting cleared for new structures. He added that the landscape inside the plant was also changing to make way for modern, state-of-the-art blast furnace, steel melting shops and finishing mills as laid out in SAIL’s corporate plan.