Bhilai Steel Plant

The Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP), located in Bhilai, in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh, is India's first and main producer of steel rails, as well as a major producer of wide steel plates and other steel products. The plant also produces steel and markets various chemical by-products from its coke ovens and coal chemical plant. It was set up with the help of the USSR in 1955.[1]

SAIL-Bhilai Steel Plant
Public Sector Undertakings in India
(Central Govt. Organization)
Traded asNSE: SAIL
IndustryMetallurgical Process
Founded1955
HeadquartersBhilai, Chhattisgarh, India
Key people
A K Rath (CEO)
ProductsRails, Plates, Structurals, Rebars and Wire Rods
ParentSteel Authority of India Limited
Websitewww.sail.co.in/bhilai-steel-plant/about-bhilai-steel-plant/

Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP) is eleven-time winner of the Prime Minister's Trophy for best integrated steel plant in the country.[2] The plant is the sole supplier of the country's longest rail tracks, which measure 260 metres (850 ft).[3] The 130 - meter rail, which would be the world's longest rail line in a single piece, was rolled at URM, Bhilai Steel Plant(SAIL) on 29 November 2016.[4] The plant also produces products such as wire rods and merchant products. Bhilai Steel Plant has been the flagship integrated steel plant unit of the Public Sector steel company, the Steel Authority of India Limited and is its largest and most profitable production facility. It is the flagship plant of SAIL, contributing the largest percentage of profit.[5]

History

The government of India and the USSR entered into an agreement, which was signed in New Delhi on 2 March 1955, for the establishment of an integrated iron and steel works at Bhilai with an initial capacity of one million tons of steel ingot.

The main consideration for choosing Bhilai was the availability of iron ore at Dalli Rajhara, about 100 km from the site; limestone from Nandini, about 25 km from the plant, and dolomite at Hirri, about 140 km away, and coal from Korba and Kargali coal fields. The water for the plant comes from the Tandula dam and power from Korba thermal power station. The plant was commissioned with the inauguration of the first blast furnace by then president of India, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, on 4 February 1959. The plant was expanded to 2.5 million tons in September 1967 and a further expansion to 4 MT was completed in 1988. The main focus in the 4 MT stage was the continuous casting unit and the plate mill, a new technology in steel casting and shaping in India.[6]

The organisational framework

Bhilai Steel Plant functions as a unit of SAIL, with corporate offices in New Delhi. Over the years, Bhilai Steel Plant developed an organizational culture that forces its commitment to values and stimulates continuous improvements and higher levels of performance. The chief executive officer controls operations of the plant, township and iron mines. The CEO is assisted by his D.R.O.s(Direct Reporting Officers), i.e. the functional heads, executive directors, general Manager concept of zonal heads, and HODs who integrate functions with clear accountability for achieving corporate vision, company goals and objectives.

Modernization and expansion programs

Bhilai steel plant is raising its capacity of steel production through modernization and new projects. The major upcoming project is commissioning of giant Blast Furnace of volume 4060 cubic meter with hot metal production capacity of 8000 Tonnes per day.

Projects in progress include a new compressed air station, oxygen plant, new installations to support power requirements and ore handling capacities expansion. Presently, the total requirement of iron ore of Bhilai Steel Plant is met from Dalli Rajhara Iron Ore Complex (IOC). In view of IOC's rapidly depleting reserves, BSP is opening an iron ore mine at Rowghat, about 80 kilometres (50 mi) from Dalli Rajhara in Narayanpur District of Chhattisgarh. Accordingly, Bhilai Steel Plant will develop the mine in Block-A of Deposit-F of Rowghat with a production capacity of 14.0 MT per year during 2011-12. For environmental reasons, the beneficiation plant shall be of dry circuit type. However, the grant of forest clearance under Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 is still pending.[7]

The Bhilai steel plant has created steel for one of the Railways' most challenging projects, construction of the 345 km (214 mi) railway line and plane network between Jammu and Baramulla at an investment of ₹19,000 crore (US$2.7 billion). BSP has also developed a special grade of TMT rebars for use in the high altitude tunnel inside the Banihal Pass. BSP had also developed the special soft iron magnetic plates for the prestigious India-based Neutrino Observatory (INO) project of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC). It has also developed special grade high-tensile (DMR249A) steel for building India's first indigenously built anti-submarine warfare corvette, INS Kamorta[8]

The plant was further expanded on 14 June 2018.

Environment management

BSP has taken measures in the areas of waste management, resource utilisation and pollution control and has initiated several waste reduction programmes. Besides reducing greenhouse gas output, BSP is replacing the ozone-depleting CTC, aided by UNDP. BSP has earned Voluntary Emission Reduction (VER), (a sort of carbon credit) for two of its projects.

Abiding by Corporate Responsibility for Environment Protection (CREP) guidelines and monitoring, it has taken steps to "check fugitive emissions from Coke Ovens and has installed Air cooled self sealing doors resulting in significant reduction in door emissions" The plant has introduced a de-dusting system, electrostatic precipitators and a coal dust injection system in the blast furnaces and in other units.

Bhilai Steel Plant manages Bhilai Nagar township which has 13 sectors.

Accidents

On 12 June 2014, a gas leak in Bhilai Steel Plant killed six people, including two senior officials. Over 50 people were affected by the accident. A breakdown in the water pump house caused a leak of the poisonous gas carbon monoxide, which infiltrated the premises due to pressure differences along the purification chamber lines.[9] Among the dead were two deputy general managers, while the injured included Central Industrial Security Force personnel as well as workers and officials of the public-sector plant. The leak started at around 6:10 pm IST.

On 9 October 2018 Thirteen plant employees died including FOUR B.S.P. fire services officials and 14 were injured including SIX B.S.P. fire services officials in a blast at the plant. The blast took place in a pipeline near the coke oven section at the steel plant in the town of Bhilai.

Output
Production
Product mixTonnes/annum
Semis533,000
Rail & heavy structural750,000
Merchant Products (angles, channels, Rrund & TMT bars)500,000
Wire Rods (TMT, plain & ribbed)420,000
Plates (up to 3600 mm wide)950,000
Total saleable steel3,153,000
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See also
  • Steel Authority of India

References
  1. "The Bhilai Steel Plant". Field to Factory: Film and ethnography of industrialisation in Chhattisgarah, Central India. Jandarshan and LSE. Archived from the original on 5 April 2003. Retrieved 24 June 2012.
  2. "Prime Minister hands over PM'S Trophy for best Integrated Steel Plant in the Country to BHILAI Steel Plant". SAIL. 4 February 2015. Retrieved 26 January 2019.
  3. "Bhilai Steel records its best ever loading for dispatch to Indian Railways". The Economic Times. Retrieved 30 December 2017.
  4. Das, R Krishna (30 November 2016). "SAIL-BSP starts production of world's longest single-piece rail". Business Standard. Retrieved 26 January 2019.
  5. Bose, Kunal (1 July 2013). "New generation rails will be Bhilai Steel's crown jewel". Business Standard. Retrieved 26 January 2019.
  6. "BHILAI STEEL PLANT". Steel Authority of India Limited. SAIL, All Rights Reserved. Archived from the original on 23 June 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2012.
  7. "Bhilai Steel Plant's Modernisation and Expansion Program Gains Momentum" (PDF). Steel Authority of India Limited. SAIL. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 May 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2012.
  8. "GRSE hands over first indigenous warship, INS Kamorta to Indian Navy". Economic Times. 12 July 2014. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
  9. "Bhilai Steel Plant gas Leak Accident kills 6 and injures 40". IANS. news.biharprabha.com. Retrieved 13 June 2014.

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