Development and Efficiency

At ACC, we are committed to continuously investing in strengthening our market position and evolving into a more efficient, cost-competitive, and environmentally sustainable organisation. Some of our key initiatives this year include:

Efficiency Improvement

We strive to be one of the most cost-competitive cement manufacturers in the country and to achieve this goal, we consistently invest in various areas of our operations. These include several initiatives, such as reducing our clinker factor, enhancing energy efficiency, optimising our raw material and fuel blends, improving our power sources, and expanding the utilisation of alternative fuels and raw materials in our manufacturing processes. We have incorporated approximately 14.62 million tonnes of waste-derived resources, including 0.82 million tonnes from Geoclean, into our manufacturing operations. This aligns with our commitment to reduce our reliance on natural resources and promote sustainability.

Product Quality Management

Our quality parameters are stringent, and we closely monitor them to continually improve our overall Product Quality Index (PQI). Our product quality monitoring strategy involves daily testing of defined quality parameters, measurement of coefficient of variations at three-day and 28-day intervals, clinker quality assessments, customer satisfaction surveys, bi-monthly product benchmarking, bi-monthly application-oriented product testing, monthly testing of random market samples, and monthly assessments of bag quality index.

We comply with all statutory requirements as mandated by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) as well as all weights and measures norms. As part of our statutory compliance, our bags display our contact details to enable customers to communicate any complaints, observations, or queries.

Key Initiatives To Improve Overall Process/Product Quality

Supply Chain and Logistics

We leveraged digitalisation initiatives across the supply chain to optimise costs. We also used best-in-class tools for network optimisation, sales & operations planning, and e-platforms for freight procurement. All our logistics excellence projects are managed through automated dashboards.

Freight Reduction

We are taking various initiatives to improve efficiency and negotiate contracted rates. We use the latest e-procurement platforms to get real-time freight rates, and closely monitor vendor performance to improve their value proposition

Safety and Sustainability

We have re-opened our Driver Management Centres (DMCs) to engage with the driver community and promote safety-oriented behaviour. Transport Analytics Centre (TAC) has helped us develop more meaningful safety dashboards for use by the DMC. Additionally, we are developing a Carbon Reduction tracker and working on bio-fuel trials, e-vehicles, lead reduction, and mode mix to reduce our carbon footprint. In-plant automation through RFID has helped to augment efficient and safe fleet movement inside the plant as well.

Captive Power Generation

We have taken strategic initiatives in our value chain to ensure efficient energy sourcing and have developed in-house capacity to meet our energy requirements. We are utilising alternative fuels/biomass, waste heat recovery (WHR), and renewable energy sources such as wind and solar. Additionally, we have implemented an energy management system (ISO 50001:2011) to improve our energy efficiency. A significant portion of our power consumption is generated through our captive power plants.

We have successfully increased our in-house power generation by 3%, which includes a 1% reduction from CPP and a 139% increase in WHRS. We have also approved further investment in WHRS, and the progress is well on track.