While iron ore is
available domestically, the industry is dependent on imports for coking coal.
NEW DELHI: The domestic steel industry has
sought a roadmap to ensure the availability of 161 million tonnes of coking
coal for scaling up the country's annual steel making capacity to 300 million
tonnes by 2030.
Coking coal--also known as metallurgical coal,
used exclusively as an essential ingredient for steel production-- and iron ore
are the two key raw materials used for manufacturing steel through the blast
furnace route.
While iron ore is available domestically, the
industry is dependent on imports for coking coal.
At the sixth meeting of the Advisory Group for Integrated Steel Plants (ISP), a
presentation on the roadmap to ensure availability of 161 MT of coking coal for
future expansion of steel industry to 300 MT (Million Tonnes) capacity as per
NSP 2017 was made by Indian Steel Association (ISA), sources said.
The presentation was made to Union Minister
for Steel Jyotiraditya Scindia and other senior officials of the ministry.
It was agreed upon that the future course of
action may be charted for exploring the possibility of expanding the sources of
coking coal especially from Russia, Mongolia, Canada and USA, the sources said.
The minister has asked ISA to come up with a
medium-term and a long-term strategy to utilise the low-grade iron ore available
in the country.
On the issue of steel imports, ISA has been
advised by the minister to provide a note on surge in imports and suggest
measures to curtail the same, the sources said.
According to industry data, imports of
finished steel rose 21 per cent to 4.77 MT in 2022 from 3.94 MT in 2021.