Managing environmental impacts

Cutting CO₂ from cement and lime

Our ongoing investment in carbon-efficient plant and processes continues to drive significant reductions in CO₂ emissions resulting from cement and lime production. Following the replacement in 2010 of two rotary kilns with a new carbon-efficient Maerz lime kiln at our production facilities in Tunstead, Derbyshire, we have reduced kiln-related CO₂ emissions by 40%. Likewise, our ongoing investment in waste-derived fuels for cement production at Tunstead has contributed to a 41% cut in CO₂ per tonne of cement (as PCe).

Reducing emissions from cement and lime

Our programme of investment has achieved major reductions in atmospheric emissions from our cement and lime operations at Tunstead and Hindlow in Derbyshire. Compared to a 1998–2000 baseline period, we achieved the following reductions in 2011:

Cement

• 97% cut in particulate emissions
• 99% cut in sulfur dioxide (SO₂) emissions
• 42% cut in oxides of nitrogen (as NO₂)

Lime

• 99% cut in particulate emissions
• 97% cut in sulfur dioxide (SO₂) emissions
• 70% cut in oxides of nitrogen (as NO₂)

Compare our performance against industry average:

Alongside our cement and lime operations, we take action across all our other businesses aimed at managing and reducing our emissions to air, water and land and to ensure that we are compliant with all environmental permits.

ISO 14001 environmental management

Across our different operations, we proactively monitor and manage a variety of environmental impacts. We use the internationally recognised ISO 14001 standard to provide a comprehensive and consistent approach to environmental management, which can be tailored to meet site-specific needs.

We implement ISO 14001 certified environmental management systems across all our operational locations and 99% of the business is certified to this standard.

Our approach includes environmental monitoring, internal and third-party audits, target setting and regular reviews to deliver continuous performance improvements.

Compliance

Within the UK regulatory framework, our cement and lime businesses are regarded as Part A1 processes subject to Environment Agency control under the Environmental Permitting Regulations. Our other sites are regulated through Environmental Permitting Regulations by local authorities according to the nature of their operations.

The maintenance of our licence to operate is fundamental to our business, but we also seek to go beyond meeting regulatory requirements to drive forward industry-leading standards in environmental management. As part of this, we continue to monitor and report on our environmental performance publicly to our different stakeholders.

We are currently preparing for anticipated changes in the environmental permitting process in England and Wales, including moves towards single authorisation permits for individual sites regulating water discharge, abstraction and waste management. The latter includes the management of extractive waste (such as soil or overburden materials) that is created from quarrying activities. We are also preparing for the implementation of the Industrial Emissions Directive.

Environmental incidents

As part of our ISO 14001 environment management systems, we record any complaints from local communities as well as environmental incidents.

As a responsible company, we actively encourage our people to report any environmental incidents openly and honestly so that we can investigate thoroughly, review our approach, and make any changes necessary to prevent recurrence.

We classify incidents by their potential severity and environmental impact. In 2011, a total of 236 environmental incidents were recorded. This is a slight increase on our performance on last year and may be attributed to greater awareness among employees and improvements in the reporting of such incidents. Of the incidents reported, none of them were recorded as either Level 3 (significant environmental impact) or Level 2 (moderate environmental impact) according to our parent company Anglo American's classification system. No environmental prosecutions or fines were received in 2011.