Cabinet approves extension of applicability of New Investment Policy-2012 to RFCL

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) on Wednesday gave its approval for the proposal of the Department of Fertilizers for extension of the applicability of New Investment Policy (NIP)-2012 read with its amendment dated October 7 for the Ramagundam Fertilizers and Chemicals Limited (RFCL).

According to the statement issued by the Cabinet Committee, RFCL is a Joint Venture Company consisting of National Fertilizers Limited (NFL), Engineers India Limited (EIL) and Fertilizers Corporation of India Limited (FCIL) which was incorporated on February 17, 2015.

"RFCL is reviving the erstwhile Ramagundam Unit of FCIL by setting up a new gas-based green field neem coated Urea Plant with the installed capacity of 12.7 Lakh Metric Ton per annum (LMTPA). The cost of the RFCL Urea project is Rs 6165.06 crore. Gas to RFCL plant is supplied by GAIL through the MBBVPL (Mallavaram-Bhopal-Bhilwara-Vijaipur Gas Pipeline) of GSPL India Transco Limited (GITL)," the statement said.

"The state-of-the-art gas-based RFCL Plant is part of the initiative taken by the Government to revive the closed urea units of FCIL/HFCL in order to achieve self-sufficiency in the urea sector. The start of the Ramagundam plant will add 12.7 LMTPA indigenous urea production in the country and help to realize the vision of the Prime Minister to make India 'Aatmanirbhar' (self-reliant) in the urea production. It will be one of the largest fertilizer manufacturing units in South India," it stated.

The project will not only improve the availability of fertilizer to farmers but also give a boost to the economy in the region including development of infrastructure like roads, railways, ancillary industry besides ensuring food security to the nation,

RFCL has various unique features like the latest technology HTER (Halder Topse Exchange Reformer) to save energy in the production of Urea among single train largest capacity Urea plant, 140 meter high prilling tower to ensure best quality urea prills, fully automated bagging, and rail/truck loading facility for dispatch of Urea having the capacity to dispatch more than 4000 MT Urea per day, MCR (Main Control Room) equipped with DCS (Distributed Control System), ESD (Emergency Shutdown system for improved safety and availability), On-line MMS (Machine Monitoring Systems), OTS (Operator Training Simulator), Environment monitoring system. The systems are operated by highly motivated, dedicated, well-trained Operations.

The facility integrates the world's best technologies aiming to meet the demand for urea in Telangana as well as in the other Southern and central states of India, namely Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Chattisgarh, Maharashtra. The urea produced at RFCL will be marketed by National Fertilizers Limited.

The CCEA also stated that the Government of India is reviving five closed units of FCIL/HFCL by setting up new Ammonia Urea Plants of 12.7 LMTPA capacity each at Ramagundam (Telangana), Talcher (Odisha), Gorakhpur (Uttar Pradesh), Sindri (Jharkhand) and Barauni (Bihar) through the formation of joint ventures of leading PSUs with an investment of about Rs 40,000 crore.

"On operationalisation of these Plants, indigenous urea production will be increased by 63.5 LMTPA which will reduce the import of urea to that extent and will save a huge amount of foreign exchange," it said.

( With inputs from ANI )