)
Five companies including Korean steel maker Hyundai Steel expressed their willingness to construct an iron ore terminal at Paradip port during a pre-bidding conference held at the port.
Others who took part in the pre-bidding conference were Essar Steel, Jindal Steel and Power Ltd, Pune-based Elicon Engineering and state-owned National Buildings Constructions Conference Ltd.
Paradip Port Trust (PPT) has floated a fresh global tender for building an iron ore terminal, as the original winner of the contract could not initiate work for the cargo handling facility since 2009.
The fresh tender has been floated on Built, Operate and Transfer (BOT) basis.
The proposed terminal will be a deep drought one meant for carrying iron ore cargos. The tender document did not specify the capacity of the terminal, but in its earlier proposal the bidder had submitted plans for a terminal with 10 million tonne a year capacity.
Currently the port has a 10 million tonne a year iron ore cargo berth. Odisha has the potential to export about 30 million tonne ore every year.
The cost of the terminal was earlier fixed at Rs 506.30 crore. But in the recent tender document the port revised the expenditure to be incurred in building the terminal to Rs 591.31 crore.
In July 2009, the concession agreement for the terminal between PPT and Blue Water Iron Ore Terminal Pvt Ltd, a special purpose vehicle floated by the Hong Kong-based Noble Group, in partnership with Gammon Infrastructure Projects and MMTC, was signed.
However, problems in getting environment and forest clearances delayed the project construction work, and court cases over relocation of iron ore plots within port area created further uncertainties.
Other factors such as softening iron ore rates globally amid concerns of supply of iron ore due to severe restrictions in Odisha did not let the project to take off, port sources said.
