Nalco CMD Anshuman Das, Director (Production) SS Mohapatra, Director (HR) SC Padhy, Executive Director PR Choudhury and General Manager AK Sahu held discussion with officials and workers on the crisis in Angul plant after the company shut down two units of its power plant for shortage of coal and is gearing up to terminate operation of 200 pots.
The low lME price (london Metal Exchange) of alluminium is also cited to be reason for the termination of the pots.
"Production may decline by around 10,000 tonnes this quarter," told Nalco Director (Production) SS Mohapatra, adding that the company could not buy costlier imported coal or coal auctioned in the open domestic market as this would mean incurring heavy losses.
In order to immediately tide over the crisis and reduce the severe impact of higher losses in terms of costs, Executive Director PR Choudhury informed that the management decided to restrict power generation to 600 MW out of total 1,200 MW. Choudhury appealed all the employees to come together and strive hard to curtail the losses by reduction in power generation and metal production as well as to make sincere efforts even for small cost savings wherever possible.
Notably, Nalco had to decide to cut its daily aluminium output by 25 per cent due to coal supply shortages caused by an accident at Bharatpur mine that supplies the dry fuel to the public sector unit. The company received around 10,000 tonnes of coal a day for the past 10 days from Mahanadi Coalfields limited (MCl), against a daily operating requirement of about 16,000 tonnes.
However, MCl PRO D Mehera told, “We have asked Nalco to lift required coal from our other mines at Talcher as we have got sufficient coal stocks there.”
In view of shortage of power, Nalco has already started metal tapping from Monday from the pots to shut down around 200 pots out of 823 operating pots from total 960 pots.
On the other hand, National Youth INTUC general secretary Nirmal Samal in a letter to the Union Mines Minister told that mindless expansion of the plant without arranging coal and water had caused the present crisis. The management, without arranging the enhanced coal, has been passing bucks on others for the crisis, he charged.
He continued, “After the expansion, Nalco has never achieved production to full capacity. A total of 120 out of 960 pots in the smelter plant were shut down last year resulting in the slashing of aluminium production to 1,050 tonnes a day from the normal production of 1,200 tonnes and caused a loss of Rs 2 crore a day. Again Nalco will incur heavy loss due to the shutdown of 200 pots.”
Samal demanded CBI enquiry into the unplanned expansion which has benefited many influential people and led to national loss. Again, the Mines Ministry and management must publish a White Paper regarding the present crisis, loss, people responsible for the loss and future planning to stabilise the position of the company, he stressed. An Inter Ministerial Group should be formed to look into and monitor the supply of coal and other raw material to Nalco to achive full production, he added.