We fulfil the requirements of our clients while caring for the environment
We take proactive initiatives to help reduce our carbon footprint, while enhancing product quality and brand promise.
Our products and services help our customers and construction professionals reduce their carbon footprint, manage
maintenance requirements and cost of operations, making the projects greener and cleaner with lower environmental footprint.
Responsible and sustainable
products
For us, the key to achieve sustainable
construction lie in responsible
product design and development,
sustainable fuel mix, innovative product
development and resource efficiency
through efficient waste management.
As part of our extended product
responsibility, we have conducted a life
cycle assessment and have developed
the Environmental Product Declaration
(EPDs) of all the PPC and Compocem
products. This is also available on the international B2B portal ‘Environdec’.
We are India’s first cement company
to work out EPD after detailed life
cycle assessment.
Besides identifying and reducing
the environmental impact of our
product process/technology, these
also aid in addressing the health and
safety aspects related to the use of
construction products.
Our research and innovation team
works continuously on introducing
products which are not only innovative in nature but are also responsible and
sustainable. Continuing this trend, we
launched Kawach, a water-repellent
cement, during 2020. This product
has 33% less carbon footprint in
comparison to OPC products.
This premium quality solution has
been developed through our in-house
manufacturing and product innovation
efforts. Kawach is specially formulated
to prevent water seepage in the most
effective manner, resulting in improved
durability and lifespan of house.
During the year under review, our
Technical Services team provided the
following:
- Engineers provided technical
guidance and supervision for
slab casting to 14,478 customers
through video conferencing
during lockdown
- Concrete mix proportions at
14,721 sites
- Modular curing solutions at
2,391 sites
- Rainwater harvesting at 268 sites
- Preparing to apply for Eco Label for
our products (except OPC)
The three initiatives (Concrete Mix
proportions, Modular Curing, and
Rainwater Harvesting) helped us
in saving ~70 million litres of water,
a robust step towards sustainable
construction initiative.
During the year, we conducted various
skill-building workshops engaging
about 12,500 contractors, masons, and other construction professionals
(architects and engineers) through
class-room and virtual training
sessions, workshops and webinars
spanning over 39,000 man-hours for
skill-building.
Our PPC product from Darlaghat
plant (Himachal Pradesh) received
the ‘ProSustain’ certification from the
global certification body, DNV Business
Assurance, reflecting our promotion of
the adoption of responsible and
cost-effective measures for
incorporating sustainability into product
design, development, production, and
supply chain management.
New products
At Ambuja Cement, our continued
focus on IHBs and customer needs has
been the foundation for introducing
innovative products and solutions. We
work closely with our consumers in
understanding their needs. We have
identified that even newly-constructed
residential buildings face issues like seepage, dampness and leakages at a
very early age.
These are largely due to:
- Persistent warm or
high temperatures
- A tropical wet and dry climate
- Extreme weather conditions like
heavy rains and very hot summer
- Shallow water table
- Improper and ineffective drainage
systems causing waterlogging
We took this challenge and under
the umbrella of Ambuja Certified
Technology, launched new
water-repellent cement product –
Ambuja Kawach.
Since the launch, this product has
gained strong traction. Driven by its
premium positioning, it is driving
the overall net selling price of
Ambuja Cement.
Certification received
for PPC product from
Darlaghat plant
PROSUSTAIN
Sales of Kawach
cement in 2020
(lakh mt)
1.80
Less carbon footprint of
Kawach compared to OPCs
(%)
33
The digital transformation journey
is part of our strategic planning.
Digitalisation has been initiated in
the following areas—operational
excellence, controls and compliance,
and culture. The key focus of the
year was on implementing digital
tools in various parts of operations.
We strongly feel that digitalisation will
not just help in providing competitive
advantage but would also help in
creating a sustainable growth journey
in the coming years.
We turned this pandemic into
an opportunity and helped the
organisation emerge as digital savvy.
As a part of operational excellence,
we focused on three major areas—
enhancing asset optimising, improving
logistical efficiency and increasing
sales and marketing effectiveness.
Enhancing asset optimisation
In line with the LafargeHolcim’s
Plants of Tomorrow, we focused
on implementing digital tools that
helped in better asset optimisation
and ensuring higher plant availability.
We have implemented tools like
Distributed Control System (DCS), Tool
Location System (TLS) and Supervisory
Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA)
which are expected to enhance plant
efficiency and increase uptime.
We have introduced Internet of
Things (IoT) across the manufacturing value chain and are using artificial
intelligence and machine learning under
the project EDGE to facilitate rapid
deployment of predictive models and
seamless connectivity with plant
data sources.
We have picked up multiple initiatives
on predictive quality (cement fineness,
cement quality) and predictive
maintenance (VRM failure, refractory
life). This will help us in optimising
energy consumption per tonne of
cement and enable us to save cost.
We are conceptualising Digital Eye
to digitally monitor factory and plant
operations (through drone and video
analytics) to operate effectively and
enhance safety.
Increasing logistics efficiency
Logistics account for a substantial
part of the total operating cost in the
cement manufacturing value chain.
Hence, it requires effective fleet
management to rationalise cost. We are
leveraging various software packages
to enhance efficiency.
Enhancing sales force efficiency
We have implemented sales force
automation for our sales team.
This helps us in getting better
intelligence related to market dynamics
and better pricing of our products.
We have also rolled out a contractor
loyalty programme application where
more than 48,000 contractors are
enrolled with over 50% of them being active every month. This influencer
engagement initiative helps us in
strengthening the pull for our
premium products.
Invested to digitally strengthen
our sales and marketing team
(`lakhs)
33
Share of revenues derived
from products used is
sustainable building design
and construction
(%)
~90
