National Mineral Policy 2006 - Department of Mines

manufacturing cannot be swayed by denying prospecting or mining licences, particularly in asituation in which plentiful supplies of ilmenite are available in the world. The prospects forestablishment of a processing industry are also dampened by the facts that there could soonbe excess capacity worldwide for titanium products, and that the cost of energy in India, isvery high. Making grant of PL/ML for ilmenite or other titanium bearing minerals conditionalon the establishment of industry in which there is an emerging situation of oversupply wouldnot be wise and would also be inconsistent with the architecture of mining regime that wehave proposed earlier.7.81 The Committee concludes, therefore, that, like other minerals, mining of ilmenite,rutile, and leucoxene should be subject to the general mining regime whereby whilepreference may be given to value adders among multiple applicants in the grant of PL/ML,where applicants are willing to set up industry based on ilmenite, such licences must not bedenied on the ground that there are no applicants proposing to set up an industry based on themineral. In the latter case such licences should be freely granted on the basis of the provisionsof the MMDR Act, particularly Section 11 thereof. India’s reserves of ilmenite are very largeand as will be seen in the next subsection, production for exports has the potential not only toboost earnings from exports but also to increase employment, which are gains that thecountry should not be deprived of while waiting for an entrepreneur who may be willing toset up an industry in the country based on the mineral to turn up.Ilmenite Export Policy7.82 India has an estimated reserve of 461.37 million tonnes of ilmenite, a majorproportion of which is considered as sulphate grade except the Chavara deposits in Keralaand Manavalakurichi deposits in Tamil Nadu. The sulphate grade is what most of the worldhas and the Chavara and Manavalakurichi deposits are unique in that they have much highertitanium dioxide content. Much of the supply from countries other than India is of low-gradeilmenite, with titanium dioxide content of less than 50 per cent, while the exports from Indiahave more than 50 per cent titanium dioxide content. The use of the sulphate grade ilmenite islimited to production of titanium dioxide pigment (through sulphate route) and to titaniumdioxide slag by smelting in the electric furnace. Though the technology to treat sulphategrade ilmenite exists, its viability depends on the cost of power and of the mitigating stepsneeded to tackle the environmental fallout. Moreover, alternatively, technology such as177