The Ugar Sugar Works Ltd., being the largest sugar manufacturing company in the South of India, has developed a very good environmental protection mechanism in and around the plant. During the operation of the sugar plant as well as the distillery unit, the factory is contributing to water and air pollution in huge quantities; However, the factory is able to control the same within the norms laid down by Central Pollution Control Board , State Pollution Control Board and the Ministry Of Environment and Forest.

For the water pollution control in the distillery unit, we have established four biomethanation plants. The effluent of about 1000 tons per day is being treated and the generated methane rich biogas is being used for the one MW power generation. In this treatment, almost 80-85% of the pollution load is converted in to energy. Further, a combined effluent treatment plant is being operated, in which all the sugar factory effluent and the domestic waste from the employee colony is being treated along with the distillery effluent after biomethanation. In this plant, about 16 Nos of aerators (25 Hp, 10 Nos & 5 Hp, 6Nos) are provided in a two stage aerobic treatment followed by clarification. The treated effluent is being mixed with all the low pollutant water like condensate, cooling tower over flows etc. and is finally being sent to irrigation for 1500 acres of sugarcane fields.

The Ugar Sugar Works Ltd. has also put up a One MW Biogas based power plant with the financial assistance from the Ministry of Non-conventional Energy Sources, New Delhi. The power being generated out by biogases is used for the whole effluent treatment operation and the excess power is used in the factory operation. The elemental pure sulphur is being separated from the biogas and is used for agriculture purposes.

The organization has also established 4 Nos. of 85 M3 capacity community biogas plant in the year 1992. The raw material for the biogas generation is sugarcane press mud (6 tons per day) and the biogas is supplied to over 180 families in the employees colony. Now, the company is planning to utilise the entire quantity of pressmud generated in the sugar unit for biogas power generation of about 2 MW.

We have also established a 44 MW bagasse based power plant. For all the boilers, wet scrubbers are provided to reduce the air pollution. The collected ash is used for the brick manufacturing process and is sold as manure to the farmers. For the entire environment management of the sugar, distillery and co generation unit, the factory has established a self-monitoring system with excellent laboratory and modern equipments. Approximately Rupees Eight Crores have been spent for environment management. Now, the company is installing a new effluent treatment for the spent wash of the distillery i.e. Five Effect Falling Film Evaporator with Thermal Vapour Compression (TVR) system for zero pollution. The organization is certified with both ISO 14001 (Certification for having the best environment management system) and ISO 9001 (Certification for having the best quality management system) .