Waste Water Discharge
ITC endeavours to achieve zero effluent discharge in all its Units. Reflecting the efforts and progress in this direction, a number of ITC Units – the Cigarette Factories at Bengaluru and Saharanpur, the ITC Group Research & Development Centre at Bengaluru, the Leaf Plant at Anaparti, the Packaging & Printing factory at Tiruvottiyur, and the Cast Coating Plant at Bollarum, near Hyderabad, already utilise the entire quantity of their treated effluents for operating their cooling towers, flushing toilets, gardening and other appropriate activities.

ITC’s Paperboard and Specialty Paper Units have made significant progress in the endeavour to ensure that the entire volume of their treated effluents is used for agriculture. This is in line with the recommendation of the Ministry of Environment & Forests, Government of India, and the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), in the voluntary charter that they have proposed for the 17 most polluting industries, including the paper industry. These Units already implement stringent water conservation measures. But as the manufacture of paper and paperboards is intrinsically water-intensive, these Units still discharge some treated water.

The voluntary charter proposed by MoEF and CPCB recommends that paper units move to 100% discharge of treated effluents for farming and agriculture.

Chemical, oil and fuel spills
ITC’s EHS guidelines require all the Units of the Company to plan the storage and handling of chemicals, oils and fuels in properly designed and tested storage vessels. The Company has effective spill control arrangements and infrastructure like bunds and retaining walls in its Units. These are routinely checked to ensure that they are in good condition. No spills of chemicals, oils, or fuels were noted in 2003–04 by any ITC unit.

Incidents of fines for non-compliance
ITC maintains a ‘beyond compliance’ status in EHS performance in its Units. Any non-compliance is dealt with immediately. The Units promptly respond to any inadvertent violation pointed by stakeholders or corporate EHS auditors. As a result, there were no fines for non-compliance imposed during 03–04.

Total environmental expenditure
ITC remains committed to a very high level of EHS performance. This is backed by suitable investments and financial commitment. During 2003–04 ITC Units incurred a capital expenditure of Rs. 2.6 million and a revenue expenditure of Rs. 11.65 million on EHS projects.