BL reported that Ambuja Cement has suspended the plan to set up a one million tonne grinding unit at Barh in Bihar with an investment of INR 140 crore.
Mr AL Kapur MD of Ambuja Cement said that the grinding unit project at Barh has been suspended owing to delays in the setting up of the NTPC power plant, from which fly ash was to be sourced and will be replaced by further augmenting the grinding capacity at Bhatapara in Chhattisgarh.
The Bhatapara unit currently has a grinding capacity of 1.2 million tonnes a year.
In 2006, NTPC had announced its plan to set up a super thermal power project at Barh but no significant progress has been made since then. Ambuja Cement has also decided to go slow with the proposed 1 million tonne grinding unit at Sanand near Ahmedabad. The project at a cost of INR 275 crore has been deferred to 2010.
Mr Kapur said that “Though the demand for cement has been good of late, we are yet to wipe out the previous losses. We will revisit the Sanand project in 2010.”
