"We hope to get the approvals by December and go for commercial production," said Rajiv Kumar, vice-president (operations), Tata Steel Kalinganagar Project. The company has sunk in about Rs 22,000 crore till date out of the Rs 25,164 crore estimated first-phase cost. Kumar said heating of the coke oven battery, a crucial component of the steel mill, had started in May and the first batch of cokes will roll out on August 19. He said the second phase, comprising another three mt steel capacity, will start after completion of the first phase. The second phase is expected to go on stream in 2019.
"As both phases share some common facilities, nearly 25 per cent of phase-II work will be completed with implementation of phase-I," he added.
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"Our plan is to ramp up the capacity to 15 mt over the next 10 years."
Phase-I will mostly produce hot-rolled coils, to be sold in the domestic market.
"We will focus on rural market as it has a good potential," he said and added there was no plan to export. The company also intends to sell high-quality hot rolled coils to the automobile, defence and infrastructure industries. The firm will source raw material from its existing mines, Joda and Khandbandh, in Odisha and also from Nuamundi in Jharkhand.
Tata Steel had signed a deal for the Kalinganagar project in 2004. However, following resistance in land acquisition and death of 14 tribal protesters in a police firing in 2006, work could not start in real earnest till 2010.