ICVL likely to acquire mines in Poland

Following a meeting with Polish Ambassador Piotr Klodkowski last week,steel minister Beni Prasad Verma has decided to visit Warsaw from September 30 for three days along with the top brass of his ministry to facilitate the signing of a MoU with Poland after which ICVL can commence the process of acquiring coking coal mines of the East European nation.

Poland has coal reserves of about 17 billion tonnes,located mainly in Upper Silesia and in the Lublin basin,of which 44 per cent is coking coal. Till 2011 it was the eighth largest exporter of coking coal. The SPV seeks to be owner of about 500 million tonnes of coal reserves by 2019-20 by acquiring overseas coal assets. In the current financial year,the country is expected to import around 40 MT of metallurgical coal as against 33 MT in the last fiscal. Paucity of this grade of the fuel has led to the steel ministry demand demerger of Bharat Coking Coal from Coal India’s fold and making it an independent entity to meet the growing needs of domestic steel utilities.

Poland has recently decided to open its mines to overseas firms and has zeroed in on Indian companies for the same. ICVL,formed in May 2009 jointly by Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL),National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC),Coal India Limited (CIL),Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL) and National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) as a special purpose vehicle (SPV),has a capital base of about Rs 10,000 crore.

“Both SAIL and RINL annually spend around Rs 11,000 crore to import coking coal. Once ICVL is able to explore the fuel from Polish mines,both the PSUs would be relieved from paucity. I have asked ICVL to complete its due diligence at the earliest and begin preparations for exploration there,” Verma told The Indian Express. The original plan of asking SAIL to acquire coal assets had to be shelved as the PSU is currently undergoing expansion programme,he said.

Welcoming the move,SAIL chairman CS Verma said that ICVL’s success would be a definitive move towards ensuring a long-desired raw material security for both the PSUs.