By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, January 31, 2017: National Aluminium Company Limited (Nalco) on Monday signed an MoU to set up a joint-venture company in partnership with Neelachal Ispat Nigam Limited (NINL) for producing Coal Tar Pitch.

The proposed joint venture company will set up a Coal Tar Distillation plant by utilising Coal Tar generated from NINL’s Coke Oven plant at its 1.1 million tonne per annum integrated iron & steel plant at Kalinga Nagar in Duburi, according to a press release issued by Nalco on Tuesday.

The move is part of the state owned aluminium major’s new business strategy of investing in backward integration to sustain its mainline operations. The statement however was silent on the investment that will go into the project.

“The agreement is part of the new business plan of Nalco to ensure backward integration and sustain the plans for forward integration,” said Nalco chairman Tapan Kumar Chand.

As part of the plan, said NINL will be preparing a techno-economic feasibility report for the joint venture project.

The MoU was signed by S K Satpathy, General Manager (Business Development and R&D) and S B Jagdale, joint managing director on behalf of NALCO and NINL, respectively in the presence of Tapan Kumar Chand, chairman, Nalco. Other senior officials from Nalco who were also present include, N R Mohanty, Director (P&T), K C Samal, Director (Finance), V Balasubramaniam, Director (Production), B K Thakur, Director (HR), K N Ravindra, Executive Director (CS) in addition to senior executives of NINL at Nalco’s Corporate Office in Bhubaneswar.