Tata to set up first steel scrap recycling plant
Interestingly, India is the fastest growing steel market in the world which is generating increasingly larger volume of scrap.
Kolkata: Tata Steel Group, one of the top global steel companies with an annual crude steel capacity of 27.5 million tonne per annum (MTPA) and operations in 26 countries and commercial presence in over 50 countries, has teamed up with Aarti Green Tech, a unit of the Ludiana-based Aarti Steels, to put up India's first scrap recycling plant in Rohtak, Haryana. The proposed plant with a capacity of 5 lakh tonne per year, will be built on BOO (built, own and operate) model with a total capital outlay of Rs 150 crore. It is expected to commence commercial production in the second half of the current fiscal.
Interestingly, India is the fastest growing steel market in the world which is generating increasingly larger volume of scrap. Tata Steel's latest move aims at giving the company the first mover advantage in scrap-based steel making, top company officials said. At present, the annual demand for steel scrap in India is 30 million tonne, with five million tonne imported every year. Automobile, construction and ship-breaking industries are the largest generators of steel scrap.
"In preparing for the future, Tata Steel has set up a steel recycling business to meet the growing demand for steel in a sustainable manner in the long run. The steel recycling business will help formalise the scrap market in India and help the country transition to a scrap-based steel making route in the long-term," said T V Narendran, CEO & MD, Tata Steel.
Once the first such plant is up and running successfully, Tata Steel has plans to replicate the same model and set up similar plants across the country, top officials said.
Significantly, at present, the Indian scrap industry is unorganized and highly fragmented. Besides, the availability of clean scrap is very low as well. That's not all. Most of such operations are manual now and lack of safety and environment standards make the operations risky to life and health as well. Tata Steel's entry into this area, therefore, is expected to make things much more formal and well organized.