The Board of State-owned Travancore Cochin Chemicals Ltd (TCC) has approved the company’s plant of setting up a synthetic rutile (titanium dioxide) plant at a cost of Rs.90 crore.

The proposed plant with a capacity of 33,000 tonnes per annum is likely to come up in the coastal belt of Alapuzha (formely Alleppey) in Kerala.

TCC would soon be appointing a consultant to prepare the detailed project report, which is expected to be ready by the end of December 2000.

The project would be a joint venture between TCC, Kerala Minerals & Metals Ltd and Kerala State Industrial Development Corporation. The Union government, through The Technical Development Board, has already committed to lend Rs.20 crore to the project.

At present, there are four manufacturers of synthetic rutile in the country with a combined installed capacity of 1.6 lakh tonnes per annum and an annual production level of around 60,000 tonnes.