The Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) has decided to carry out third party ‘Environment Compliance Audit’ of Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP). In this regard, a contract agreement was signed between SAIL/BSP and M/s Bhagvatihi Anna Lab private Limited(Hyderabad) on July 22, 2016 in the presence of R C Kulkarni, GM (Power Facilities), a BSP press release informed. D P Sen (DGM- Corporate Env Group) and S R Suman (DGM Env.-BSP) will coordinate all activities pertaining to the audit which is likely to be completed in nine months, it informed. The scope of work covers assessment of the status of compliance against all the statutory requirements with respect to environment as applicable for iron and steel making, identifying the gap and recommend time-bound Environmental Management Plans for both short term and long term for enhancement of the existing environmental performance, for both the scenarios - present and future, with a 5 to 10 years perspective considering the upcoming technological/operational and legislative changes. The above third party environment compliance audit is being conducted for the first time in India for “an Integrated Steel Plant Operations”. The study will help BSP in improving its environmental performances and ensure compliance of ever increasing statutory compliance requirements. After completion of the Environmental Compliance Audit at BSP, the similar study is proposed to be initiated for other SAIL units. SAIL recognizes the fact that although the steel is the most environment friendly product, its production process is not so. In order to contain the environmental footprint of its processes and activities in Bhilai Steel plant and other units, SAIL has initiated various measures which includes adoption of clean technologies, incorporation of environment management systems etc, the press release informed. Meanwhile, it may be recalled that BSP under its proposed Environment Management Programme as part of its ongoing modernization and expansion project has plans of recycling treated township sewerage for industrial use. It will also carry out continuous monitoring of 'Total Organic Compounds' at the outlet of the effluent treatment plant, officials informed. The industrial waste water is already being properly collected and treated, they stated. Notably, the expansion and modernisation of Bhilai Steel Plant is underway to take its steel manufacturing capacity from 4 MTPA to 7 MTPA. Notably, BSP which had been taking several key steps during the past years to preserve the environment has already eliminated use of CFC-11 by replacing it by Li-Br based Chiller unit, way before the target date of January 1, 2010. Procurement of Carbon Tetra Chloride (CTC) has been stopped and use of Trichloroethylene has been started, officials stated. Two projects under the aegis of United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have been implemented in BSP for the elimination of use of CTC. Procurement of Halon based fire extinguishers have also been replaced by FM 200 based units. All industrial package air conditioners using CFC-12 were also replaced in a phased manner by units using CFC free refrigerant. The plant has brought down the use of ozone depleting substances to 3.05 tonnes in 2014 from about 10 tonnes a decade ago. The ozone depleting potential, a true measure of consumption of Ozone depleting substances, has also been reduced to 0.167 tonnes by BSP in 2014, which is amongst lowest in industries. Under the ongoing Expansion/Modernization projects, BSP has taken due care to fully comply with the Montreal protocol in procurement and installation of, Air conditioning/ refrigeration units. It is also ensured that, the fire protective equipment being procured is also fully complying with the Montreal protocol.