Indian aluminium production running at over 1.2 million tpy

India’s production of primary aluminium grew by 14.9% to 1,152,530t in the financial year ending Mar 2007 from 1,003,182t in the previous year, according to provisional figures from the country’s ministry of mines.

On an annualized basis production has been running at above 1.2 million tpy since December of last year.

The growth in the last 12-month period came primarily from Balco, which is jointly owned by the government and Vedanta Resources. Balco completed a major expansion of its Korba facility from 100,000tpy to 345,000tpy in the third quarter of last year. That was later than scheduled after the ramp-up of the new 250,000tpy smelter was thrown off course by a power outage in the second quarter.

Balco production has averaged around the 355,000tpy level since December and output of 314,267t in the Apr 06-Mar 07 period represented year-on-year growth of 71%.

Hindalco recorded group production growth of “just” 4.4% over the same period, producing 441,876t in the last financial year. (The ministry’s figures are slightly different from those reported by the company itself but they are within an acceptable margin of error.)

That, however, masks the fact that the company is still in the process of ramping up the expansion of its Hirakud smelter. The first phase expansion from 65,000tpy to 100,000tpy has been completed and the company is now progressing the second-phase lift to 143,000tpy with a target completion date at the end of calendar 2007.

At 39,379t in March itself, Hindalco group annualized production was a new record at 463,656t and we’d expect that figure to creep upwards over the coming months.

The small Malco plant, owned by Vedanta, is also seeing production creep. Its output rose by 2.6% year-on-year to 37,652t in the Apr 06-Mar 07 period.

State-owned Nalco’s production was flat year-on-year at 358,735t but its Angul smelter will provide the next step-change in national production when it completes an expansion from the current 345,000tpy capacity to 460,000tpy, something that is targeted for end-2008.

Looking further forwards in time, there is a profusion of Indian smelter projects under development.

Vedanta’s 500,000tpy greenfield Jharsuguda project has passed its detailed engineering stage with initial construction work “in full swing”, the company said in its most recent quarterly update. Commissioning is scheduled for mid-2009.

Hindalco lists no fewer than three greenfield projects it is currently working on. Each would have a capacity of 325,000tpy. The first—Aditya—is penciled in for commissioning in 2011, the second—Mahan—for 2012 and the third—Lathehar—has no firm project timetable yet.