RSP achieves Rs 924 crore profit

Bhubaneswar, Apr 03(UNI) Rourkela Steel Plant(RSP), a unit of Steel Authority of India Limited(SAIL), has achieved a record Rs 924 crores profit during the first three quarters of fiscal 2006-07 and is on its way to surpass the earlier highest annual profit achieved during 2004-05.

The RSP had commenced the fiscal with a proactive strategy of increasing production volumes and maximizing capacity utilization with a view to controlling costs and improving its profitability.

According to an official release issued here today,the RSP has entered a new chapter in its history by producing a record 2.124 million tonnes Hot Metal from its blast furnaces and an all time best Crude Steel output of 1.992 million tonnes besides total Saleable Steel production of 1.941 million tonnes.

For the first time the RSP crossed the capacity utilization achieving an outstanding 116 per cent rated capacity. At the same time, Hot Metal, Crude Steel and Saleable Steel units registered the highest ever growth of around 20 per cent compared to the levels achieved in last year fiscal.

The plant's niche products from its finishing mills also registered best ever performance in Plates, Hot Rolled Coils, Hot Rolled Plates and CRNO registering growth of between 10 to 25 per cent.

Backed up by this performance RSP dispatched a record 1.935 million tonnes of saleable steel, an increase of 20 per cent than last year dispatches.Outstanding improvements were also recorded in Coke Rate per tonne of hot metal, Specific Energy per tonne of Crude Steel, Specific Water consumed per tonne of steel, lining life of LD Converters and several others leading to cost reduction of nearly Rs. 132 crores during the year.

The steel plant, sources said, would take up its expansion to produce nearly 3.6 million tonnes of hot metal,3.4 million tonnes of crude steel and 3 million tonnes of saleable steel.

UNI