Alang Sails In The Rough Sea With A Dip In Inbound Vessels

ASIA’S most oversized ship-breaking yard, based in Alang, in Gujarat, is expecting the lowest turnover in over a decade, with 90 vessels beaching from April to December of the financial year, lower than the corresponding figures observed during the first two years of Covid.

Per available data for the first three quarters in the last six years at Alang, 152 vessels reportedly beached in 2021 to 2022, 139 in 2020 to 2021, 141 in 2019 to 2020, 170 in 2018 to 2019, 166 in 2017, and 2018, and 195 in 2016 and 2017.

In terms of weight of scrap, Alang reportedly logged about Rs 8 lakh light displacement tonnage (LDT), which refers to the importance of the hull, equipment, and machinery of a vessel but does not include cargo, fuel, crew, etc.) in the first three quarters of the current fiscal year. On the other hand, the Ship Recycling Industries Association (SRIA) mentioned that the LDT toward the end of the current financial year might be the lowest in more than a decade.

Specialists have to say that the ship breakers of Bangladesh and Pakistan can afford to pay more for a vessel as they get a reasonable rate for the extracted steel. Due to the new BIS standard, India’s ship breakers do not receive a decent price for the vessel’s recycled material.

Per the BIS standards that came into effect in 2012, recycled ship metal cannot be used directly to make TMT bars that are used widely in the construction domain. Considering that about 200 vessels are dismantled each year, the steel production by the re-rolling mills is about 3.5 million tons.

The steel produced from a dismantled vessel is reportedly used in manufacturing TMT bars, TMT rods, structural steels, construction steels, sheets, plates, wire roads, ingots, and billets.

The metal from a dismantled vessel can be used to make steel products provided the breakers offer a history of metallurgy. Shipbreakers claim that this isn’t economically sustainable for them.

There are more than 50 plots of 130 in Alang now, and only 6000 workers are working instead of the previous number of 25,000.

References: Indian Express, Times Of India

Alang Sails In The Rough Sea With A Dip In Inbound Vessels appeared first on Marine Insight – The Maritime Industry Guide

Source: Maritime Shipping News