The awareness of water as an finite resource to be conserved and recycled as much as possible has also been taken into account by the global cement industry for a long time. In India, JK Lakshmi Cement’s subsidiary Udaipur Cement Works Ltd (UCWL) has carried out significant work to make sustainable use of harvested rainwater at its limestone mines in Rajasthan. By Naveen Kumar Sharma and Jitesh Singh Darmwal, Udaipur Cement Works Ltd, India.
From being unused to becoming a lifeline for the local area and for business, the exhausted 50 year-old captive limestone mine pits of Udaipur Cement Works Ltd (UCWL) have turned into large pool of rainwater-harvested bodies on which many lives depend.
The management and staff of UCWL believe that water is a shared resource, and that ensuring its availability for future generations and other life forms is a moral responsibility. Sustainable values have led UCWL to become a water-positive company by achieving a water positivity index of 1.7x – ie, providing more water than it uses.
