About 70 Maharashtra sugar mills gear up for oxygen manufacturing

To fulfill the rising demand for professional medical oxygen to take care of Covid-19 people, about 70 sugar mills in Maharashtra are gearing up for production oxygen.

“This is a well timed phase taken by mills in Maharashtra. About twenty five mills are now in the course of action to set up oxygen vegetation and we are focusing on about 60-70 sugar mills that have monetarily performed pretty properly. The vast majority of these mills are in rural locations and the demand for oxygen below could be met by sugar mills,” mentioned Prakash Naiknavare, MD, Countrywide Federation of Cooperative Sugar Factories (NFCSF).

He additional, “Mills will want to modify distilleries for oxygen production. Also, mills will have to take care that the commitments of ethanol source are met. With oxygen production, mills are shouldering social responsibility. Also, this could be a business enterprise design for the mills.”

Naiknavare additional that NFCSF is heading to go over oxygen production with sugar mills in other States.

Orders pour in

BB Thombare, President of West Indian Sugar Mill Association (WISMA), told BusinessLine that fifteen mills including personal and cooperative mills have placed orders for skid-mounted oxygen production models. “We have approached manufacturers in China, Taiwan as neighborhood manufacturers mentioned they would need 8-ten months to fulfil the orders. Each plant has the potential to refill ninety-100 oxygen cylinders each day which will be supplied to governing administration and personal hospitals at a nominal rate,” mentioned Thombare.

He additional that mills have placed orders for 600 oxygen concentrators.

WISMA has appealed to sugar mills aross the state to set up a person plant each individual and procure twenty five oxygen concentrators to fulfill the oxygen need in their localities.

Just lately, Nationalist Congress Celebration (NCP) Chief Sharad Pawar had held a meeting of millers to go over oxygen production in mills. Of the 190 sugar mills that begun crushing this time in Maharashtra, 167 mills have shut their crushing operations and 23 sugar mills are however working.

Business design?

Previous calendar year, as Covid-19 scenarios multiplied, lots of sugar mills begun sanitiser production. According to industry gamers, mills benefited from sanitiser production regardless of selling the item at minimum prices.

According to some of the vital gamers in the industry, sugar mills have no technique to manufacture oxygen and want molecular sieve modification in ethanol plant for filtering oxygen. “What comes about to the investment decision when there will be no demand for medicinal oxygen?,” a person of the senior industry gamers reiterated talking to BusinessLine.

Vasantdada Sugar Institute (VSI) headed by Sharad Pawar, NFCSF and WISMA are with each other functioning on a extended-expression approach on oxygen production so that mills proceed to be in the business enterprise even soon after the demand for professional medical oxygen recedes.