Neelachal Ispat aims to save ~200 cr via CDI

“The adoption of CDI technology will help us replace 150 kg of coking coal per tonne of hot metal production, and will be 30% cheaper. It will cut our dependence on coking coal, prices of which are volatile” S S MOHANTY Vice-chairman & MD, Neelachal Ispat

Neelachal Ispat Nigam (NINL), a steel PSU co-promoted by MMTC and two Odisha government-owned entities, hopes to save close to ~200 crore on its annual production cost by deploying Coal Dust Injection (CDI) technology at the blast furnace in its Kalinganagar plant.

NINL, known to be the country’s biggest producer and exporter of pig iron, runs a 1.1 million tonne per annum (mtpa) steel unit at Duburi within the Kalinganagar Industrial Complex, touted as Odisha’s steel hub.

“The adoption of CDI technology will help us replace 150 kilograms (kg) of coking coal per tonne of hot metal production, and will be 30 per cent cheaper. It will cut our dependence on coking coal, prices of which are volatile and supplies concentrated in the hands of a few players, mostly from Australia and Canada,” said S S Mohanty, vice-chairman and managing director of NINL.

Mohanty said the commencement of operations from NINL’s captive iron mines promises to be a game-changer. “The opening of our own mines will obviate the need to buy from others. It will also accrue savings of ~150-200 crore on our operations.”

Meanwhile, the CDI technology will result in improvement of techno-economic parameters and enhance hot metal productivity at the blast furnace. CDI facilitates the consumption of cheaper coal in a blast furnace, replacing the expensive coke and thereby cutting down cost. The facility will augment efficiency and raw material optimisation, by facilitating direct consumption of coal and reducing coke rate.

NINL accomplished the capital repair of its blast furnace in April last year. Subsequently, it set new benchmarks in single-day, monthly, quarterly and half-yearly hot metal production. The firm also resumed steel billet production at its state-of-the-art Steel Melting Shop (SMS) from December 2018, and expects to start operation of its captive mines early next fiscal year.