8DECEMBER, 2025VEDANTA ALUMINIUM STRENGTHENS INDIA'S ALUMINA SUPPLY WITH 5 MTPA PLANTCARBON CAPTURE EMERGES AS LOW-COST PATH TO CUT STEEL EMISSIONSVedanta Aluminium has raised its Lanjigarh alumina refinery capacity to 5 million tonnes per year which is a huge leap that makes the overall capacity of India to refine alumina to close to 13 million tonnes per year.The increased plant is currently the largest single location alumina refinery in India, with around 38 percent of the nationwide alumina, and the largest refinery worldwide other than in China.In November the refinery had the highest monthly total production in its history, with 254 kilotons. This was an 8 per cent increase over the last month and 68 per cent increase over the last year, indicating that the operations were better since more material was moved, less power was used and conversion costs were reduced.Rajiv Kumar, CEO of Vedanta Aluminium, emphasized the strategic importance of aluminium for India's industrial growth. "Scaling our Lanjigarh operations to 5 MTPA is both a capacity milestone and a step toward a resilient aluminium value chain," he said, reinforcing the company's focus on long-term value creation.The growth started with a 2million tonne/year green field project, with future increases in capacity in stages beginning in 2020. The CEO of Vedanta Alumina Business, Pranab Kumar Bhattacharyya, emphasized the accuracy, dynamism, and cooperation which saw the project to conception to commissioning.In addition to the development of industry Vedanta Aluminium maintains community programs in education, health, and skills development in the area of Lanjigarh. The capacity enhances the alumina supply chain in India and also aids downstream production, the alumina needed in the infrastructure, automotive, and manufacturing industries, which increases the level of operation and competitiveness in the global market. India's steel industry may be on the brink of a major shift as carbon capture emerges as a low-cost way to cut emissions from one of the country's most carbon-intensive sectors.A new joint study by Climate Policy Initiative and Dastur Energy finds that capturing and reusing carbon dioxide released during steelmaking could be cheaper than other green steel solutions, giving producers a practical path to lower emissions without massive disruption.The study notes that India's steel plants, largely dependent on coal-based blast furnace processes, emit around 370 million tonnes of CO2 annually, or roughly 2.2­2.5 tonnes per tonne of steel. CCUS -- carbon capture, utilization and storage -- offers a way to trap that CO2 and either reuse it or store it, avoiding much of the output that would otherwise enter the atmosphere.Industry leaders say the economics make sense. JSW Group's Pankaj Satija called CCUS "an important decarbonisation lever in the steel industry" and noted the company is exploring practical applications and even CO2 transport and storage hubs. While production costs would rise by about $72­80 per tonne of steel with CCUS, that is still lower than the costs linked to hydrogen-based or natural gas alternatives.The total investment needed for full adoption of carbon capture technology in India's integrated steel mills could reach $12­14 billion over the next 25 years. Early demonstration projects alone will require around USD 200 million in the first five years.The government is also pushing cleaner production with initiatives like the Green Steel Taxonomy and the National Mission on Green Steel, underscoring the strategic role carbon capture could play in India's industrial decarbonization strategy. TOP STORIES8DECEMBER, 2025
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