HZL fires smelter in Rajasthan

Hindustan Zinc Ltd (HZL), a group company of Vedanta Resources Plc and a metals and mining major, on Thursday commenced its 170,000 tonnes per annum (tpa) hydro Phase-II zinc smelter at Chanderiya in Chittorgarh district of Rajasthan.

The smelter was commissioned in 20 months, a world record. The new smelter will increase the production capacity to 670,000 tpa as well as bring it closer to its plan to produce one million tonnes of finished metal by 2010. HZL's finished metal capacity was 204,000 tpa in 2002, at the time of its disinvestment by the Centre.

To support the increased production capacity, HZL's Rampura Agucha mine in Rajasthan is also under expansion to increase the ore production capacity from 3.75 million tpa to 5 million tpa, taking HZL's total ore production capacity to 7.10 million tpa.