Goa Carbon's Paradeep unit shutdown likely to last 7-10 days

23 August 2021

The maintenance shutdown at the Paradeep unit of Goa Carbon Ltd from Saturday will likely be for 7-10 days, a senior company official told Informist.
 
In a filing with the stock exchanges on Monday, the company said that the operations at Paradeep unit had been temporarily shut down for maintenance work. In a separate exchange filing on Monday the company also informed of a similar shutdown in its Bilaspur unit from Friday.
 
Goa Carbon produces calcined petroleum coke and sells to domestic and overseas aluminium and steel companies. Of its three manufacturing units at Goa, Paradeep and Bilaspur, the Paradeep unit is the biggest with an annual production capacity of 168,000 tn. The Goa unit has a 100,000 tn annual capacity while that of the Bilaspur unit is 40,000 tn.
 
The company has been regularly putting one or more of its three units under temporary shutdowns in the last few quarters.
 
Goa Carbon effects such shutdowns for maintenance work and "due to the absence of viable export and domestic orders".

The latest one in Paradeep will likely be a minor one, according to the company official. "It is also a conscious decision by the company to optimise the feed rate and also to optimize the costs; else we would not like to take a shut down," he said.

In the September quarter of last year too, the Paradeep unit was shut down for 13 days while the shutdown period in Goa unit was six days and that in Bilaspur unit was 49 days.

Longer shutdowns were taken by the company in the June quarter when the Paradeep unit was shut for 27 days, Goa unit for 76 days and Bilaspur unit for 36 days.
 
Despite the lengthy shutdown periods by Goa Carbon in the June quarter the net sales jumped 64% on the year to 2.1 bln rupees, data from Informist Corporate Fundamental Database showed.
 
The operating profit, as denoted by the earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, rose significantly to 273 mln rupees in Jul-Sep from 45 mln rupees in the year ago quarter. The net profit too jumped to 145 mln rupees from 1.2 mln rupees.
 
Goa Carbon's customer base is dominated by Hindalco Industries Ltd and Vedanta Aluminium and Power which together account for around 80% of the company's total revenue, a report by rating agency Acuite Ratings and Research said in April.