BHUBANESWAR: The State Government on Tuesday assured the Vedanta Group that it will solve the company’s raw material problems within three to four months during a meeting between Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and Vedanta Group chief Anil Agarwal. They discussed supply of raw material to Lanjigarh plant which is running below its capacity at present.
Talking to mediapersons after the meeting, Agarwal said the State Government has assured the group to resolve the raw material crisis being faced by the Lanjigrah Alumina Refinery to ensure that the plant runs at its full capacity.
“The Chief Minister said the Government is committed to running the plants and assured to provide bauxite for the purpose. He said you have set up the plants without having bauxite linkage while others prefer to set them up only after getting raw material linkage,” Agarwal said.
The plant is running at 25 per cent of its capacity of one million tonne per annum. It will be expanded to two million tonnes if the raw material supply improves. In order to run the expanded plant 20 million tonnes of bauxite would be required, he said and added that as a result of the acute shortage of ore, the company’s smelter plant at Jharsugda is operating at only 25 per cent of its capacity.
“Efforts are being made to gradually increase the smelter’s capacity utilisation. The Chief Minister has also assured to resolve the power purchase issue to run the 1.25 mtpa new aluminium smelter plant at Jharsuguda within 15-20 days, which has been lying idle without power,” the Vedanta Chief said.
The company has been generating 3,600 mw of power from its two power plants, 1200 mw from its CPP and 2400 mw from its IPP, he said and added that he had requested the Chief Minister to allow Vedanta Aluminium Limited (VAL) to consume the entire power produced by it to run its plants at their full capacity. The Chief Minister, he said, had assured him to take a decision in next 15 to 20 days on the issue. Agarwal also met Chief Secretary GC Pati before meeting the Chief Minister.