L'T lifts veil on $226m Chennai megayard.

(From Lloyds List)

Byline: Plan to build tankers up to VLCC range writes Shirish Nadkarni in Mumbai

Larsen ' Toubro has detailed its plans for what is touted to be India's largest shipbuilding yard, to be set up in Chennai by the first quarter of 2009 at an estimated Rs10bn ($226m) cost.

With South Korean, Norwegian and Japanese shipyards boasting order books overflowing into the next decade, owners the world over have started looking at India and China as relatively reliable centres for newbuildings.

Mumbai engineering colossus L'T hopes to attract customers for large tankers to be built at the greenfield 1,500-acre yard, which it claims would have the capacity to build vessels of up to 350,000 dwt tankers going into the very large crude carrier range. It would also be able to repair 50-60 ships a year.

No other Indian shipyard can boast such a capacity, with the government-owned Cochin Shipyard, the largest existing facility, capable of constructing tankers of up to 120,000 dwt.

This capacity has recently been matched by ABG Shipyard at Dahej on the Gujarat coast.