India’s Lloyds Metal and Energy Limited (LMEL) has commissioned an 85 km iron ore slurry pipeline with transportation capacity of 10 million mt per year, at its Surjagarh iron ore mines in the western state of Maharashtra, a company statement said on Friday, May 16.
In the second phase, the pipeline will be extended to cover 195 km.
Earlier this month, the company announced that it was seeking environmental clearance to ramp up capacity of its iron ore mine to 25 million mt per year, from 10 million mt per year at present, making it the country’s largest non-coal mining operation.
LMEL said that, following the expansion, at least 10 million mt of total output would be transported through the slurry pipeline, hence reducing load on roads in the mining district.
The company expects at least 30,000 mt of iron ore to be transported on a daily basis and part of it to be used for pelletisation at its plant at nearby Konsari.
This is scheduled to be operational next month and LMEL is planning construction of three more pellet plants, work on which is expected to start at the end of June.
These projects are linked to the company’s proposal to set up an integrated greenfield steel mill at Konsari.