Cement, Energy and Environment

9 Environmental Governance and Indian Cement Industry Jitesh Singh Darmwal and Naveen Kr Sharma J K Lakshmi Cement Environmental Governance is a concept/a tool that advocates sustainability, an idea of sustainable development through balancing all 3 pillars i.e. Environment, Social and Economic. It includes systematic management and implementation of dimensions of sustainability, that is focused on being centric to Environment and at the same time being co-relating and evaluating to other aspects. The Basic assumption is that the natural goods are for every living being, and they tend to prosper when shared with concerned value and thought of consumption, considering the need for each other and future generation. According to United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Environmental Governance can be defined as, “Multi-level interactions (i.e., local, national, international/global) among, but not limited to, three main actors, i.e., State, market, and civil society, which interacts with one another, whether in formal and informal ways; in formulating and implementing policies in response to environment-related demands and inputs from the society; bound by rules, procedures, processes, and widely accepted behavior; possessing characteristics of good governance; for the purpose of attaining environmentally-sustainable development”. The emergence of the term Environmental Governance holds its roots 3 decades back when the world was sensitized with truth and the obvious concept of Importance of environment, after which way to sustainable development through joint efforts was put on the Books. On theoretical aspect, it is covered under the subject of Political ecology, which deals with daily conflicts and negotiations resulting in some definitive behavior influencing decisions. Environmental Governance deals as a conceptual umbrella that holds multiple facets of growth and development cycle like consumption, conservation, protection, and exploitation altogether. Some key features of Environment Governance Include: 1. Inculcation of Environmental concern in all levels of decision making. 2. Considering and Evaluating social life, economic aspects, infrastructure growth and development as a component of Environment footprint. 3. Promotion of technology, through boosting innovation towards implementing and accepting ways to a sustainable way of living, such as recycling, reuse, Cradle to cradle system, emphasizing circular economy, etc. 4. Providing a set of policy and regulations, through transparent system disclosure to deliver a fair governance module. Global concern for the environment is clearly visible with nos. of conferences, treaties, conventions, meeting held/being held through the course of history since last three decades at multiple places around the globe. Various economies of the world are participating and signing their intended commitments towards environment and sustainability with targets to achieve. Some of the most important treaties include the Montreal Protocol and Kyoto Protocol, out of which the Montreal is the most successful one that actually resulted into a substantial decrease in CFC’S that harm the Ozone layer, this is what was achieved of good environmental governance. There are examples of economies that have revised their development plans, like as of India to keeps its vision through “Smart Cities”. Another example is the “International Solar Alliance” that takes shared an ambition to reduce the cost of finance and technology to harness the energy of sun through financial help and policy interventions, which will boost greener energy footprint. Also, Implementation and tracking of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are helping economies to find innovative solutions. Overview of Environmental Governance in Indian Cement Industry Indian cement industry is the second largest in the world with installed capacity of more than 410 Million Tonnes, is among one of the most energy efficient Cement Industry in the World. Achieving some of the best specific thermal and electrical energy figures, it still pushes in fields of optimization, innovations and technology absorption, to do more and create new benchmarks. On the sustainability front, it encompasses the most significant projects, plans, and systems in place that helps maintain balance