Awareness Session on Green Buildings at Hindustan Zinc
Hindustan Zinc, a Vedanta group company, is India’s only and the World’s second Largest Integrated Producer of Zinc-Lead-Silver. An environment friendly company, Hindustan Zinc is the key initiator in adopting green technologies.
Last year, company had set a benchmark in sustainability by being recognised as one of the few CII-IGBC Platinum rated buildings in India and the first Company to receive the Platinum Green rating in Rajasthan.
Yashad Bhawan- Head Office of Hindustan Zinc has implemented several green features to enhance the building performance. Yashad Bhawan runs completely on Solar Energy and has a lush green belt across it and the residential colony of the Company.
On 15th September, Hindustan Zinc in association with CII (Confederation of Indian Industries) – Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) organised an awareness Session on Green Buildings at Yashad Bhawan.
The event was graced by the presence of Mr. Chandra Singh Kothari, Hon’ble Mayor, Udaipur. In his address highlighted the need and importance of going the green way and also shared the activities and initiatives of the Government in increasing green belt in the City. He congratulated Hindustan Zinc for being the only CII-IGBC platinum Rating Green Building in Rajasthan and thanked for the company’s contribution towards Udaipur Smart City project. He also requested the support of every citizen especially architects to make buildings of Udaipur green.
Mr Praveen Jain-Head Corporate Affairs, Hindustan Zinc welcomed the audience and highlighted the various green features of Yashad Bhawan.
Hindustan Zinc and IGBC are collectively working towards the goal to further enhance the awareness on Green Building performance and company foresees that next decade will be remarkable for integrated sustainable built environment. This will mostly be in the form of large integrated townships, green & smart cities and sustainable affordable housing.
The green projects at Yashad Bhavan have achieved energy savings by 27% and water use reduction by 37%. Fresh air ventilation system integrated with active cooling system to improve indoor air quality, on-site renewable energy of 100 KWp to generate 1,62,000 units every year, Online energy monitoring system to track the energy performance of the project and identifying energy use by various building, Air Handling Units (AHU) integrated with Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) monitoring system to ensure continuous measurement of indoor environment thereby thermal comfort conditions, Water meters to record water usages are several such green initiatives implemented in the building for energy conservation.
Dr Shivraj Dhaka, Counsellor, CII – IGBC mentioned that IGBC with the support of Government & other stakeholders is spearheading the green building movement in India. Currently, India with over 4.66 billion sq. ft with 4,200 IGBC registered projects has the second largest green building footprint in the world.
The event deliberated on the importance of going the green way for a sustainable tomorrow and how it can significantly add to the top and bottom lines of a company, especially in the medium to long term. It was emphasised in the event to pursue and promote growth in the most sustainable manner and make the process more participatory and sustainable.
Mr. Pavan Kaushik, Head Corporate Communication, Hindustan Zinc, said, “Hindustan Zinc has always focused on sustainable development. The company has reduced its carbon footprints and has a strong focus on water and energy conservation projects. Company is planning to install 115 MW of Solar Power this year out of which, 16MW of Solar Power- 12 MW in Debari Smelter and 4 MW in Rajpura Dariba Complex- has already been installed. To address the growing problem of pollution in Udaipur city’s water body, Hindustan Zinc has commissioned Udaipur’s first Sewage Treatment Plant (STP), with a capacity to treat 20 MLD of sewage under the public-private-partnership model. Hindustan Zinc is now enhancing the capacity of current STP from 20 MLD to 60 MLD.”
The Company’s mining and smelting operations are based on environment friendly technologies that led the plant to conserve water and energy. The operations are working on zero discharge principle and the Company is putting all efforts and research for gainful utilization of waste generated at its mines, smelters and power plants.
Recently, Hindustan Zinc has been ranked 11th globally in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index out of 58 companies assessed. Also present were, Mr. Hansraj Choudhary – President, UCCI, Mr. Abhishek Patel – Architect, APED Pvt Ltd., renowned Developers, Architects, Contractors, Green product manufacturers, Government Officials, Educational Institutions of Udaipur City during the event.