Faced with the challenge of growing order book position for power equipments, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) has chalked out a two-pronged strategy of enhancing its capital investment and introducing round the clock manufacturing process to increase its production.
 This is done to meet the commissioning of power generation plants scheduled during the Eleventh Plan (2007-2012).
“To meet the supply schedule of power equipment of various power projects we have decided to step up our capital investment and introduce 24x7 work schedule,” company sources told Deccan Herald.

Surging demand
To meet the surge in demand and manufacturing load, critical machines in all our plants spread across the country are now being operated round the clock for all 24 hours on three shift operations, sources said.
Besides, the Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited is also working on a plan to step up its manufacturing capacity in the next 3 years to 15,000 MW per annum with a total investment of around Rs 3,200 crore, sources said adding “the idea is to equipping Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited to meet the country’s power capacity addition targets in the 11th plan and beyond.”
Incidentally, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited has been increasingly coming under criticism for not being able to take the load of producing enough power equipment to meet the power demand in coming years.

NTPC plea
In fact, National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), which mostly places its order for power equipment with Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, has been urging the government to set up another power equipment manufacturer on pattern of BHEL to meet the growing demand for power equipment.
Presently, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited is in the process of enhancing its manufacturing capacity from 6,000 MW to 10,000 MW per annum at a cost of Rs.1,200 crore and enhanced capacity of 10,000 MW will be available by the end of 2007.
Further, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited has also taken several steps for the upgradation and introduction of new technologies.