The Hindu Business Line : Simbhaoli's Rs 403-cr investment plan likely to conclude by March

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Simbhaoli's Rs 403-cr investment plan likely to conclude by March

Harish Damodaran

To help crush 20,100 tonnes cane per day

New Delhi , Aug. 23

Simbhaoli Sugar Mills Ltd (SSM) expects to complete its ongoing Rs 403 crore investment plan by March 2007, at the end of which it would be able to crush 20,100 tonnes cane per day (tcd), besides aggregate ethanol capacity of 180 kilolitres per day (KLD) and cogeneration surplus of 36 mega watt (MW).

The company, which earned a profit after tax of Rs 29.60 crore on net sales of Rs 432.17 crore for the fiscal ended March 31would be commissioning a 4,000-tcd mill at Brijnathpur in Ghaziabad by November. The Rs 111.50 crore plant is contiguous to its existing Simbhaoli facility, whose capacity was raised from 7,500 tcd to 9,500 tcd in February at a cost of Rs 24 crore. In addition, the Rs 48 crore expansion of the mill at Chilwaria (Bahraich district), from 3,800 tcd to 6,600 tcd is slated for completion in November.

Raw sugar production

The Executive Director of SSM, Dr G.S.C. Rao, told Business Line that the 2,000 tcd enhancement in the Simbhaoli unit's capacity would be for raw sugar production. "The Simbhaoli plant will have an existing 7,500 tcd refinery and a new 2,000 tcd raw sugar line. The first would produce refined sugar, which consumes 46 per cent steam or 23 tonnes of baggase for every 100 tonnes of cane crushed. The raw sugar plant will consume only 30 per cent steam or 15 tonnes of baggase. We can use this surplus in-house baggase to run the refinery in the off-season when there is no cane available for crushing", he said.

The Chilwaria and Brijnathpur facilities will produce the normal plantation white sugar using the double sulphitation process. "As there is no refining here, the steam consumption will be only 40 per cent. Our objective is to have the lowest steam consumption in the industry, which will help us save on baggase and, in turn, make us the country's largest integrated sugar concern producing raw, plantation white and refined sugar", Dr Rao said.

The Simbhaoli and Brijnathpur mills will produce high export-grade sugar of 45 ICUMSA, while Chilwaria would make regular 80 ICUMSA sugar.

All the three mills will have ethanol plants of 60,000 KLD to use molasses by-product. "The new ethanol unit at Chilwaria and expansion of the Simbhaoli facility will be over by November. Work has just begun work on a Rs 31 crore distillery at Brijnathpur. Once that is ready in March, we will be among India's top five ethanol producers", Dr Rao claimed.

By March, the company's two co-generation plants at Simbhaoli (16 MW) and Chilwaria (20 MW) are also scheduled to come on steam at a total investment of Rs 145 crore.

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