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Linde to Invest in Largest Air Separation Plant in India

10/29/2009 - The Linde Group will build and commission a 2550-tonnes-per-day air separation unit at Tata Steel's plant in Jamshedpur, India. Once commissioned in early 2012, it will be the largest air separation plant in India and one of Linde's largest in Asia.

The Linde Group plans to build and commission a state-of-the-art, 2550-tonnes-per-day air separation unit (ASU) at Tata Steel Ltd's plant in Jamshedpur, India. Once commissioned in early 2012, it will be the largest air separation plant in India and one of Linde's largest in Asia, according to the company.
 
The investment for the new ASU is nearly EUR 85 million, bringing Linde's total investment in India over the last three years to about EUR 285 million.
 
The Linde Group also has signed a long-term contract with Tata Steel to supply more than 4000 tonnes per day of gaseous oxygen, nitrogen, and argon. It currently operates two existing air separation plants supplying almost 1500 tonnes per day of oxygen, nitrogen, and argon gases to Tata's Jamshedpur operations.
 
The new ASU is part of Tata Steel's current expansion of its facility in Jamshedpur, which will increase the plant's steelmaking capacity to 10 million tonnes a year. As part of the agreement, Linde will acquire and operate three existing ASUs owned by Tata Steel for the supply of gases to their Jamshedpur works.
 
"This investment, which further deepens our solid relationship with Tata, is an example of our strong commitment to India," said Dr. Aldo Belloni, member of the Executive Board of Linde AG. "The importance of the Indian market is also reflected in our rapidly growing engineering capability in Baroda and Kolkata. Our comprehensive engineering solutions put us in a good position to meet the growing needs of steelmakers, refineries, and petrochemical plants in India."
 
In addition to meeting Tata Steel's gases requirements, the new plant will also produce liquid products to meet the growth in merchant markets throughout India. Linde is currently in the process of commissioning a new air separation plant near Dehradun in North India. The plant is expected to commence supplies of liquid and cylinder gases to customers by the first quarter of 2010. The company is also investing in a new merchant air separation plant in Maharashtra that will produce nearly 500 tonnes per day of liquid products to meet the growing demands of industry in the western region of the country.

The Linde Group is a world-leading gases and engineering company with almost 50,000 employees working in around 100 countries worldwide. In the 2008 financial year it achieved sales of EUR 12.7 billion.