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Following is an excerpt from a  report in Tradingmarkets.com.

Tata Steel is likely to start the construction work of its greenfield steel project in Orissa within two months.

“We have got necessary clearances. Work to rehabilitate more than 1,200 families have been completed and now we are going to start the construction by the end of this year,” Tata Steel Kalinganagar project General Manager N A Ansari told PTI.

Tata Steel is seeking to increase the production of steel from 27 MT to 45 MT by 2015 and it will be achieved through greenfield projects, he said and pointed out, “Kalinganagar is the first such greenfield project undertaken by the company outside Jamshedpur.” Tata Steel is setting up a greenfield steel project in Kalinganagar, Orissa, to produce 6 MT of steel per annum and is investing Rs 18,000 crore in the project. The project is scheduled to be commissioned by mid-2009.

When asked whether there has been any delay in the project, he said, “We intend to go little faster, but there has been not much delay and these are usual things happens in any big project.

“We have already placed the order for more than Rs 5,800 crore worth of equipment and materials and all other things related to planning layout and estimates have already been done,” he said.

Speaking about the company’s investments in Orissa, he said, Orissa is one state where it has planned to invest more Rs 35,000 crore in various projects.

The Statesman reported the following.

The new industrial policy of the state is laying primary importance on agro-food processing, IT, bio-technology, medicine, pharmaceuticals, garments and textile, said state energy, IT and culture minister Mr Surya Narayan Patro.

Economic Times reported

Ferro Alloys Corporation (FACOR) will invest about Rs 2,500 crore to set up a greenfield steel plant besides two power plants in Orissa.

With a cash outlay of Rs 2,500 crore, the group plans to set up a greenfield stainless steel plant in Orissa, a 45-MW captive coal-fired power plant and a 250-MW coal based independent power plant in Orissa,” CMD FACOR R K Saraf said here.

Pioneer reports that Ersama MLA and former Minister Damodar Rout on Sunday has initiated a joint political move in favour of the Posco project proposed near Paradip in his constituency.

Excerpts

“Under no particular party’s banner, political leaders met in Jagatsinghpur to chart out a strategy for a show of strength with a slogan Aage maati pare party, literally meaning land first, party later. Presiding over the meeting, Rout harped on the fact that 85 per cent people in Kujang tehsil, where the South Korean steel major wants to set up its greenfield project, were supporting the 12-million-tonne per annum plant. As they are not united, their voice is cowed down by a handful of agitators. Rout sought to prove the point that the anti-Posco brigade was a minority group making tall claims. It was decided to organise a mass meeting on Tuesday at Balitutha, which leaders cutting across party lines would address. Rout’s move follows Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik’s instructions to him to extend his support for the Posco project in his constituency.

Rout, in his turn, has asked the Jagatsinghpur district authorities to help in smooth conduct of the Tuesday meeting, to which Collector Pramod Kumar Mehrada and SP RP Singh have reportedly agreed.

More than 60 representatives from various political parties participated in the deliberations on Sunday. A few of them suggested to organise the mass meeting at a later stage, but Rout said, “Strike the iron when it is hot.”

A section of political observers, however, feels that there may be a scuffle between the anti- and pro-Posco supporters on the day”

Following is an excerpt from a report in Hindu.

According to official sources, the Union Forest and Environment Ministry on Monday issued forest clearance certificate for setting up a Doppler radar at Paradip.

“We expect operation of the Doppler radar before the next cyclone season,” said Orissa’s Special Relief Commissioner (SRC) N K Sundaray. He said that the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) would set up the radar centre at a cost of Rs 20 crores.

“We have already placed order for the radar which would cost Rs 15 crores. The department would soon start construction of the building required for the purpose,” said S C Sahu, Director of the IMD, Bhubaneswar.

… While participating at a seminar here organized on the occasion of the national day for disaster reduction, Sahu said while analogue radar, now used for forecasting cyclone, roughly indicates the possible places where cyclone would hit, Doppler radar would pinpoint the exact location.

Describing Doppler radar as a boon for the people of cyclone prone Orissa, Sahu said the people could easily be evacuated from the possible place as it could be easily identified before 12 hours.

He said had there been a Doppler radar before 1999 in Orissa, the life of nearly 10,000 people could have been saved.

Sahu also pointed out that Doppler radar could also forecast hail storm and volume of rainfall to occur at a particular place.   

Following is an excerpt from a report on this in Asian Age. Economic Times also reports on this.

India is set to become a potential goldmine as investment announcements surged to Rs 1,75,629 crores for the months of August and September 2007. The bulk of this will go to the petroleum sector, especially in states of Orissa and West Bengal, says the Assocham Eco Pulse Study.

The study on ‘Investment Announcements’ for August and September 2007 found that of the total investments announced, the petroleum sector attracted the maximum number of investment announcements, totaling to Rs 53,300 crores with Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and the Reliance Group, planning to mop up Rs 43,500 crores and Rs 8,000 crores, respectively.

Orissa attracted investment plans of Rs 55,800 crores, especially in steel and oil refinery capacity reflecting the high investment spree by the companies in the core infrastructure sector.

… The AEP tracked investment announcements made by 70 companies in the Indian private sector during August-September 2007 with investments plans ranging between two to ten years across various sectors like petroleum, steel, hospitality, real estate.

With major public private partnership projects in line, West Bengal is ranked second by AEP as the Indian companies made investment announcements worth Rs 31,200 crores in last two months. The major investors in the state would be Jai Balaji Industries, a Kolkata based steel company that announced capital expenditure of Rs 16,000 crores followed by IOC with Rs 14,500 crores and DLF Rs 700 crores.

Mumbai continues to remain the most favoured location by the services-based companies, which announced Rs 8,500 crore capex plans in areas of hospitality, entertainment and IT. Pune attracted Rs 1,334 crores investments making Maharashtra rank third with Rs 9,834 crores after Orissa and West Bengal.

Following is an excerpt from New Indian Express on this.

… Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has demanded that the royalty be fixed on ad valorem basis.

In a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the Chief Minister said that the manner in which the Centre is going to revise the royalty, the State will be a loser. The State has already sustained a huge loss because of two-year delay in the revision.

He urged the Prime Minister to compensate the revenue loss of the State and delete the provision of adjusting the cess collected by the State during payment of royalty. As per the Supreme Court ruling, the collection of cess by the State for the development of the people in the mining areas is justified, he argued.

Under the new ‘hybrid formula,’ the State will get Rs 10 more per tonne of coal which is nothing given the delay in the revision of royalty, he said.

As per the Mines and Mineral (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957, the Centre is bound to revise royalty on coal and other minerals every three years. The Act provides that the State should be compensated accordingly for the delay in revision of royalty.

The latest revision was made on August 1 after five years, the Chief Minister reminded and urged the Prime Minister to compensate the State for the last two years.

I wonder if Naveen is referring to the supreme court judgment regarding Vedanta where the supreme court asks Vedanta to give 5% of its profits for spending towards tribal development and environmental safe guards.

Contradicting earlier speculation of slow progress between the state Government and ADGC on IT center in the state capital area, today “The Pioneer” reported that

“The Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG) has evinced interest to set up an information technology centre in the city or its outskirts. The process to acquire the required 40 acres of land for the Dhirubhai Ambani IT Centre is on. After the ADAG submitted the proposal, the Orissa Computer Application Centre has forwarded it to the State-run Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (IDCO).”

It also added

“the representatives of ADAG have inspected three places in Jatni and two places in Khurda for identifying the land, according to IDCO sources.”

Following is an excerpt from a report in Reuters.com.

Mittal Steel India Ltd, power producers Sterlite Energy Ltd, a subsidiary of Vedanta Resources; Tata Power Company Ltd, Reliance Energy Ltd and two other firms will together mine a coal block in Orissa.

Mittal Steel, a part of the group that includes the world’s largest steel maker Arcelor Mittal, and power producer GVK Power Ltd have been jointly awarded a coal block in Jharkhand.

Mittal will have rights over the reserves in the two blocks equivalent to generate 750 MW power each for its proposed steel plants in the two mineral-rich states.

A report in Hindu Business line on this allocation mentions the block allocated for the UMPP in Orissa. Following is an excerpt:

The Government has also decided to facilitate the development of ultra mega power projects of about 4,000 MW capacity each under tariff based competitive bidding route using super critical technology.

Four coal blocks, with geological reserves of 1,857 million tonnes, have been allocated to two ultra mega power projects being set up in Orissa and Jharkhand. These will have generation capacity of 8,000 MW.

Following is an excerpt from a report in dnainida.com.

The Orrisa Government has decided to set up more small and micro hydel projects to generate ‘Clean Power’.

“We have sanctioned at least 28 small and micro projects which will generate hydro-power by setting up units on rivers and canals,” Energy minister S N Patro said.

Patro, after chairing a meeting of the state Technical Committee here said the government had received proposals for establishing 82 more small hydel projects in the state.

The proposals were forwarded for verification by the technical committee, official sources said.

Officials from the Department of Energy, Water Resources, Grid Corporation of Orissa and Orissa Hydro Power Generation Corporation, were members of the technical committee who would recommend the small and micro projects, they said.

The minister said while government agencies identified 34 locations for setting up small and micro hydel projects, private parties were interested in 48 other places.

“All the projects will be developed on the basis of private investments,” the minister said adding the capacity of units would range from 100 KW to 25 MW.

An additional 700 MW could be generated in the state, if the project were implemented properly, he said.

… “The small and micro hydel projects will also get a concession of 14 paise per unit of power generation,” he said.

Telegraph also reports on this and summarizes the surplus power situation in Orissa as follows:

More than 1,800MW of power is available in the state as against the average demand of 1,600 to 1700MW.

While the state generates around 600MW of this total electricity from hydro power stations, it gets around 700MW from thermal plants.

The rest is part of the state’s share from the eastern grid and the Centre–owned power plants located in the state.

The state government has already signed MoUs with 13 companies, including Tata Power, Visa Power, Calcutta Electricity Supply Corporation, Essar Power, Jindal Photo, Bhusan Energy and Sterlite Energy, last September for establishment of thermal power plants with an investment of about Rs 59,000 crore to generate about 11,000MW.

Recently, the state government has cleared expansion of three thermal power projects with an additional capacity of 2,000MW.

Sambada names some of the places where this project will be.