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Sustainability

Pollution Prevention

We prevent pollution from toxic or hazardous waste by storing all toxic and/or hazardous waste in licensed units before being collected and managed by licensed waste management contractors. The main types of hazardous waste are used oil and neon bulbs, medical waste, and pesticide packaging such as sacks. No hazardous waste is reused, recycled, incinerated, or sent to landfill. Each subsidiary has a contract with a third-party vendor that is confirmed to have met the legal requirements to transport, recycle, or process hazardous waste. All toxic and hazardous waste is disposed of according to the government regulations.

To prevent contamination of water sources from mill effluents we treat and independently test all effluent to ensure it is within legal safe limits. According to Indonesian environmental regulations, we must meet the allowable Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) and Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) thresholds of 100 mg/liter and 350 mg/liter, respectively, before our wastewater are released to waterways or rivers. Our target is to adhere to this regulation. 

Our BOD and COD levels are verified and measured every month by independent and accredited laboratories (see a sample report here). The results are also verified by government authorities through an online environmental reporting system at the national level called SIMPEL (Sistem Pelaporan Elektronik).

We also have an internal policy to use palm oil mill effluents (POME) for land application. All POME for land application should have a BOD of less than 5000 mg/liter (above which it will hazardous and poison the oil palm tree). We apply POME with a BOD level of less than 3000 mg/liter by treating our POME using anaerobic bacteria and aerated processes in our wastewater effluent treatment ponds. As much as possible, we use POME for land applications or to generate methane gas in our biogas power plant, which will reduce inorganic fertilizer use. Therefore, in all of our estates with the exception of ANJAS, we do not release wastewater to the waterways or river. We have reduced the wastewater released to waterways from 143,930 m3 in 2015 to only 63.166 m3 in 2022, all meeting the BOD and COD regulated thresholds. 

The progress and performance toward meeting our water quality target is as follows:

We measure particulate matter (PM), nitrogen oxides (NOx), and sulfur oxides (SOx), every six months in the work environment (factories and offices) as well as in residential areas close to the factory, at the source in the electricity generator and boiler chimney. The results of these measurements are reported regularly to the local Environment Agency as per the regulatory requirements. Reporting on these emissions is managed by the Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) department.

 


WATER EFFICIENCY AND REDUCTION OF WATER POLLUTION LOAD POLICY