Bhilai Steel Plant clocks highest-ever rail production in FY20

New Delhi: Registering a growth of 39.2 percent, Bhilai Steel Plant has clocked its highest-ever production of rails in the April-December period of the current financial year, the state-run steel plant said on Thursday. Bhilai Steel Plant has produced 9.23 lakh tonnes of UTS 90 prime rails in the April-December period of FY2019-20 as against the production of 6.63 lakh tonnes in the corresponding period of the financial year 2018-19. During financial year 2018-19, the plant had produced 9.85 lakh tonnes of UTS 90 prime rails.

Bhilai Steel Plant has seen robust growth in production in FY20 so far

During the April to December 2019 period of the current fiscal year, the production of UTS 90 prime rails from Rail & Strl Mill has been 6.47 lakh tonnes as against 5.37 lakh tonnes in the corresponding period of the last fiscal year, thereby registering a growth of 20.7 percent. The production of UTS 90 prime rails from Universal Rail Mill during April to December 2019 period of the current fiscal year has been 4.30 lakh tonnes as against 2.99 lakh tonnes in the corresponding period of the last fiscal year, thereby registering a growth of 43.9 percent, a press release said.

Despatches of long rail in the current fiscal year in April to December 2019 period stood at 4,49,156 tonnes. This was lower in comparison to FY2018-19 when it had touched a total volume of 4,49,973 tones.

'Graph of production of rails has been steadily rising'

With the combined efforts of both the Rail & Strl Mill and Universal Rail Mill teams, the graph of production of rails has been steadily rising in the recent months. The plant registered the highest monthly production of 1.27 lakh tonnes of rails in December 2019 as against the previous best of 1.24 lakh tonnes achieved during March 2019. This included the best-ever production of 54,629 tonnes of prime rails from Universal Rail Mill as against the previous best of 47,087 tonnes in November 2019.

During December 2019, the plant also achieved the best-ever loading of UTS 90 prime rails at 1,21,407 tonnes as against the previous best of 1,18,459 tonnes in October 2019 and the best-ever despatch of long rails at 58,358 tonnes as against the previous best of 54,588 tonnes in October 2019.

Universal Rail Mill had achieved all-time highest prime rail production of 2,414 tonnes and finished rail production of 2,519 tonnes on December 29, 2019, surpassing the previous best of 2,264 tonnes and 2,404 tonnes, respectively, on July 30, 2019. Overall URM achieved a prime tonnage of UTS-90 rails of more than 2,000 tonnes per day on as many as 10 occasions during December 2019.