JK Tyre plans significant cut in water, coal usage by 2025

JK Tyre & Industries Limited announced that it aims to ‘drastically reduce’ water and coal consumption by 2025. The company said that the decision has been to taken not just to reduce its environmental footprint but also help mitigate business risks.

The Delhi-based tyre maker informed that within next four years it plans to reduce its raw water usage for manufacturing processes across all its plants in India by 65%. “We are strictly monitoring our water usage through the installation of water metres at key points in our manufacturing units, and constantly aiming to improve the water efficiency of our operations, along with reducing our use of groundwater," said Anil Makkar, Manufacturing Director at JK Tyre.

The company added that its Kankroli and Chennai plants have already managed to achieve zero raw water usage for processes. “We use raw water only for drinking purposes in the two plants," he added. The tyre maker says that as outcome of systematic initiatives over the last five years it has emerged as a global benchmark for the ‘lowest raw water use per kg’ of tyres manufactured.

“At JK Tyre, we have long recognised water availability as a business risk and therefore, we are focused on proactive assessment and planning for water security at all our manufacturing locations essentially through continuous improvement of water efficiency (water use per tonne of finished product) of our operations", Makkar said.

Apart from the reduction in raw water usage, the company has also targeted low coal usage as it aims to replace 50% of its coal usage with biomass, by financial year 2024-25. “The shift would however entail significant investments as we will have to make changes in our boilers. We are also tying up for regular biomass supply," Makkar said.