Energy consumption On an average, Indian mills use 50 giga joules of energy to make one tonne of paper. Ballarpur Industries Ltd’s Chaudwar unit’s energy consumption is the worst imaginable

Chemical use The world moves on to chlorine-free bleaching, but Indian mills are far from following suit. Average chlorine consumption in Indian stands at 100 kg per tonne of paper

Recommendations to the sector
The objective of GRP was not only to rate the environmental performance but also recommend ways to improve it. The recommendations given to the pulp and paper sector were as follows:

1. Inputs
Sourcing of wood: Although the 1988 National Forest Policy does not allow sourcing of raw materials from government forests, the government has not made any plan to work with the pulp and paper industry to promote farm forestry. A good farm forestry programme can help to bring a large portion of degraded lands owned by poor farmers under a remunerative green cover. But as such a programme would have both national and commercial objectives, a part of the cost should be borne by the state. Currently, the government continues to supply fibre resources from government forests, which kills the farm forestry market due to the substantial difference in wood prices. Despite the lack of a good policy framework to promote farm forestry, there are several pulp and paper companies (such as Andhra Pradesh Pulp and Paper mills, ITC Bhadrachalam Paperboards Ltd., etc.), which are trying to fulfil at least a part of their needs from farmers. Both government agencies and private companies should learn from their experiences.

The paper sector rating clearly showed the importance of proper natural resource pricing for better resource efficiency

Wastepaper recycling: Even though India does recycle her resources to a considerable extent, yet her performance in terms of wastepaper collection and recycling for paper-making purposes remains extremely poor by world standards. As a result, India today is importing wastepaper. The government and paper companies should together develop a major wastepaper collection and recycling programme.

Long-term Policy for Fibre Supply: The government and the pulp and paper industry must develop a longterm vision and programme for sustainable and environment-friendly fibre supply for the country. Plantations and development of fibrous resources are long-term investments and both the government and industry must realise that these investments will neither be made nor sustained unless there is longterm support for them in the form of appropriate market conditions and fiscal incentives. As of now, government policies have been erratic and changing from time to time.

Pricing of Water: Freshwater consumption by Indian pulp and paper mills is high and conservation should be encouraged through a rational pricing structure. Consumption beyond an acceptable level should be priced at a progressively higher rate.

Sourcing of Water: Most pulp and paper mills have a large amount of land and they should be capturing and using their rainwater endowment. It is recommended that mills should think in terms of sourcing at least a part of their water requirements through rainwater harvesting. A calculation made for Sinar Mas showed that nearly 50 per cent of the company’s current water consumption could be met through its rainwater endowment. Water recycling should also be encouraged to the maximum extent possible.

Sourcing of Energy: Erratic and inadequate electricity supply is forcing mills  to move towards smaller electricity generating systems which use furnace oils, low sulphur high stock (LSHS) fuel oil and other heavier fractions which are not only subsidised but also very polluting. The government must make efforts to improve its electricity supply and work with the pulp and paper industry to use environmentfriendly energy sources as much as possible.

Technological upgradation: The pulp and paper industry today works with a technology that is way below international standards, which also results in inefficient resource utilisation and ultimately low environmental performance. The current Indian technology is the same as that used in the Scandinavian countries in the 1950s and 1960s. The Indian pulp and paper sector should invest in technology upgradation and the government should come up with a package of measures to facilitate this upgradation.

During the paper sector rating, the project found that the very debate on the use of chlorine free bleaching has passed largely unnoticed in India

Without improvement in technology, management practices and government regulations, environmental performance of the pulp and paper sector will remain low.

Use of chlorine: The global debate on the use of Elemental Chlorine Free (ECF) bleaching and Total Chlorine Free (TCF) bleaching, to reduce environmental pollution, has passed largely unnoticed in India. It is recommended that those mills which have poor technology should not get into manufacturing high brightness paper so that they can get away with the most polluting aspect of paper-making, that is, bleaching with elemental chlorine. Only firms with good process technology and end-of-pipe treatment should make bleached paper. Government agencies and NGOs should also launch an awareness programme to promote the use of unbleached paper. A national discussion should be initiated by the

Central Pollution Control Board on the need to ban the use of elemental chlorine and a statutory warning, which says that this paper is made using chlorine.

Use of agro-residues: CSE’s Green Rating Project has rated the large-scale pulp and paper sector which has a better environmental performance than the sector which has been left out, that is, the small, agro-residue-based mills. India has consciously promoted agroresidue-based mills but there is a need to think afresh on how this sector should be developed to meet the country’s pulp and paper needs as it also helps to generate rural employment and increase rural incomes. In order to reduce the environmental impact of these mills, it is recommended that any new mill with a production capacity of 40 tonnes per day with a chemical pulping process using agro-residues or wood should not be allowed to operate without a chemical recovery system. As the pulping process is more environmentally harmful than the paper-making process, large-scale mother pulp mills with a chemical recovery system should be set up to meet the pulp needs of smaller paper mills. A good research and development facility should be developed to fulfil the needs of agro-based firms by developing environment-friendly technologies for processes like chemical recovery systems.

Wastewater discharge standards: Wastewater discharge standards should not differentiate between wastewater discharged in surface waters and wastewater discharged on land. There is a substantial difference between the two standards. For example, the standard for biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) of wastewater to be discharged in water bodies is 30 mg/litre whereas it is 100 mg/litre for discharge on land. During the Green Rating exercise, it was found that most of mills which discharge their wastewaters on land also discharge their wastewaters into water bodies, especially during the rainy season. During this season, the land is saturated with rainwater and does not require wastewater for irrigation. Moreover, there is heavy runoff from farms to water bodies during this period.

Avoiding land contamination: It is important that all mills which discharge their wastewater on land even with the discharge standards for surface water should monitor the soil characteristics and quality of crops grown on the land irrigated by the effluent. A few studies have shown that though the productivity of the land goes up initially because of the availability of plant nutrients in the effluent, the land becomes unproductive after five to ten years due to increased soil salinity. Since soil contamination is difficult to reverse, it is important to assess the impact of effluent used for irrigation before allowing any mill to discharge its effluent in this manner. Thus, before allowing any mill to do so, it could be asked to first discharge them on its own land so that the results can be studied over a fairly long time frame.

Improving discharge standards: The Central Pollution Control Board should consider the development of site-specific load-based standards rather than concentration-based standards.

Fiscal Incentives: The Green Rating Project found that hardly any company or manager was making an attempt to improve environmental performance beyond the regulatory standards set by the government. There is no motivation to go beyond the standards. All over the world, if there are only regulatory standards, companies see the meeting of these standards as the maximum effort they need to make to meet their environmental responsibilities. But if fiscal incentives are provided to companies which go beyond these standards, then meeting the standards becomes the minimum effort that is made by a company to meet its environmental responsibilities. The government should consider such fiscal incentives for the pulp and paper sector.

Deemed Consent: There is a loophole in the pollution control system in the way consent is given by pollution control boards. If the pollution control board does not give consent within four months of application, then the company can take it as ‘deemed consent’. Many pulp and paper companies are today operating on ‘deemed consent’. The Central government should institute sanctions against state pollution control boards, which do not take a decision to give or refuse consent within the specified period.

Staff Training: Pulp and paper mills should undertake staff training programmes to improve the understanding of environmental management, which is currently poor. Even top managers of these mills should undergo such training, which includes process management policies, sourcing of sustainable and environmentfriendly raw materials, and waste disposal policies.

Standardisation of information disclosure: Annual report contain a substantial amount of information but either the government or the industrial associations should prepare a standardised format for the pulp and paper sector. Companies with several mills should provide resource and energy consumption and production figures separately for different mills.

Community Relations: Relations between pulp and paper companies and local communities appear to be quite strained in many cases. Companies should not only improve their environmental performance but also work with the local communities in their efforts to improve their environmental performance. Companies should report in their Annual Reports, the efforts they have made to disclose information to local communities, increase their understanding of environmental issues, involve them in the management of wastewater or supply of inputs, etc. A certain amount of money should be set aside for community relations.

With these recommendations, the project had finished the rating of pulp and paper sector.