ITC :: Sustainability Report 2007

ENVIROMENTAL PERFORMANCE

Other Businesses

Our efforts in other businesses, involving effective implementation of water audit recommendations, deployment of best available technologies, improving awareness and employee participation in water conservation initiatives have shown positive results.

ITC watershed projects already cover nearly 27,000 hectares

The Cigarettes, Leaf Tobacco and Packaging & Printing businesses have reduced Specific fresh water intake by 13%, 21% & 33%, respectively.

The Specific fresh water intake of 5.36 cubic m per million cigarettes equivalent is now very close to 5.18 cubic m of water/million cigarettes equivalent intake by British American Tobacco. (British American Tobacco-Social Reporting: 2006 progress and review).

Image of Graph showing Reduction in Specific Fresh Water Intake from the Financial Year 2005-06 to 2006-07

Zero Wastewater Discharge

Closing the water loop in a factory/hotel not only minimises fresh water usage, it also prevents pollution of the environment including that of fresh water sources.

Our Cigarette factories at Bengaluru & Saharanpur, Leaf plants at Anaparti & Chirala, Packaging and Printing unit at Tiruvottiyur, Research Centres at Bengaluru & Rajahmundry, Paperboards unit at Bollarum, ITC Green Centre at Gurgaon, ITC Sonar, ITC Grand Central and Sheraton Rajputana hotels recycled all the treated effluents by using them for flushing toilets, cooling towers, gardening, etc.

Rainwater Harvesting
- Creating a Positive Footprint

We continued to invest in additional rainwater harvesting potential, within the Company units as well as watershed projects in socially relevant areas.

The watershed projects cover nearly 27,000 hectares, also supporting our ‘Water Positive’ status for 5 successive years. In 2006-07 the total rainwater harvesting potential created is nearly 4 times the net water consumption of all our operations.

Water balance at ITC	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05	2005-06	2006-07
Fresh Water Intake	24.10	22.48	24.98	25.58	25.79
Treated effluents discharged	14.64	14.04	19.55	20.96	19.58
Net water consumption	9.49	8.44	5.43	4.62	6.21
RWH potential created within ITC units	0.24	0.39	0.34	0.61	0.47
RWH potential created through watershed projects (till 31.03.07)	12.50	15.67	16.52	18.99	23.12
Total RWH potential created (till 31.03.07)	12.74	16.06	16.86	19.60	23.59

All units in Million KL

Significant Effluent Discharges

While a number of our units are nearing the zero effluent discharge goal, three large Paperboards & Specialty Paper units account for almost 97.75% of the total treated waste water discharged. All these units have state-of-the-art effluent treatment facilities and have made significant progress towards conforming to international norms on the quality of treated wastewater discharged.