C Blast Furnace in an All-New Avatar

Jamshedpur Works team architects of C Blast furnace

Tata Steel added another glorious moment in the annals of its history with the blow-in of the upgraded C Blast Furnace today. The event was graced by Mr H M Nerurkar, Executive Director (India & South East Asia), Tata Steel as chief guest.

The newly inaugurated C Blast Furnace holds a special place for the task force of Jamshedpur. For, this is the first time that the entire project – from building to commissioning of the upgraded unit – has been designed and implemented internally by the Jamshedpur Works team. Adding feather to the cap is the fact that Tata Steel is the first steel company in the world to incorporate GIMBAL technology in this furnace. This technology, sourced from Seimens, is primarily for the purpose of providing total flexibility in material distribution, enabling customers to make significant cost savings and benefit from improvements in blast furnace operations and maintenance.

The furnace is part of the A-F Blast Furnace chain within the Jamshedpur Steel works. Structured on the lines of Tata Steel’s expansion plans, the capacity of the C Blast furnace has been increased from 0.4 mtpa (million tonne per annum) to 0.7 mtpa.

Addressing the gathering, Mr Nerurkar said,"The re-modelled C Blast Furnace compliments the technical know-how and dedication of both the Seimens as well as Tata Steel teams. I am sure that our operations at C Blast Furnace and production as a whole will now greatly be enhanced with the implementation of the GIMBAL technology. In this journey of restructuring and capacity enhancement, we have learnt quite a few lessons ourselves which will help us understand our work processes and perform even better."

About Tata Steel
Established in 1907 as Asia's first integrated private sector steel company, Tata Steel Group is among the top-ten global steel companies with an annual crude steel capacity of over 28 million tonnes per annum (mtpa). It is now the world's second-most geographically-diversified steel producer, with operations in 26 countries and a commercial presence in over 50 countries. The Tata Steel Group, with a turnover of US$ 29 billion in FY '09, has over 80,000 employees across five continents and is a Fortune 500 company. The Group’s vision is to be the world’s steel industry benchmark in “Value Creation” and “Corporate Citizenship” through the excellence of its people, its innovative approach and overall conduct. Underpinning this vision is a performance culture committed to aspiration targets, safety and social responsibility, continuous improvement, openness and transparency. In 2008, Tata Steel India became the first integrated steel plant in the world, outside Japan, to be awarded the Deming Application Prize 2008 for excellence in Total Quality Management.