India's third largest steel maker JSW Steel is likely to begin the construction of its proposed 10 million-tonne steel plant in Jharkhand by early next year, a top company official has said.
"We have set early 2009 as the target for ground breaking and plan to bring the integrated steel plant by March 2012," CEO of JSW Steel Jharkhand project R P Singh told PTI.
The company is in the process of acquiring about 6,500 acres of land in and around Sonahatu block of Ranchi district to begin civil construction of the steel plant.
"With support of the government, we are hopeful of getting the required land at the earliest," Singh said.
JSW Steel had signed a memorandum of understanding with the Jharkhand government in November 2005 for setting up a 10 million-tonne steel plant with an investment of over Rs 35,000 crore.
The Sajjan Jindal-led company has been allocated Rohne coal block in Hazaribagh district and Ankua reserved forest iron ore mine in West Singhbhum to meet the raw materials requirement of the upcoming steel plant.
While Rohne is estimated to have about 400 million tonne of semi-coking coal reserves, the iron ore mine is expected to have a stock of around 200 million tonne.
JSW Steel's annual iron ore requirement would be pegged at about 16 million tonne after the steel plant reaches its optimum production capacity. In a span of 30 years, it would need about 480 million tonne of processed iron ore.
As for meeting water requirement of the steel unit, Singh said the Jharkhand government has given permission to draw it from Subarnarekha river. The company would require about 80 million gallons of water per day for the plant.
