Author Archives: Adaniupdates

Ports serve as entry points for international trade and make it easier for commodities and services to move between nations. India boasts a long coastline spanning more than 7,500 kilometres, with numerous big and small ports that manage a substantial volume of global trade, encompassing both imports and exports. The main ports in India handled 795 million tons of cargo in FY 2022–23. Ports are essential to trade and make a substantial economic contribution to the nation.

India’s ports quickly fill with silt and need year-round dredging to keep the depth suitable for navigation. The pursuit of economies of scale by shippers and owners to cut freight costs by transporting larger quantities of products at a time has resulted in larger ships. To accommodate larger ships, the canals and berths must be deepened. This work is done by dredging ships.

Dredging is a technique used by ports to create new canals and deepen old ones, which facilitates the passage of larger vessels and increases trade efficiency. 

Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd. (APSEZL) specialises in offering reclamation and dredging solutions for port and harbour building. In 2005, the Adani Group began investing in the construction of a dredging fleet in order to accomplish the expected rapid growth in the port industry. Since then, it has been a huge success story, and APSEZL currently possesses the greatest capital dredging capacity in India. 

In addition to having dredgers, APSEZ also possesses a sizable fleet of survey ships, floating cranes, jack-up barges, multipurpose crafts, and other equipment. Our staff of more than a thousand people operates and maintains this equipment. Dredgers in good condition, staff that is highly driven and skilled, an innovative internal workshop, dry dock amenities, and survey support all pave the way for efficient operations. 

Dredging is essential to the development and maintenance of waterways in many different sectors. It serves as a versatile instrument for:

Maintaining current waterways: Dredging clears out collected debris, restores depth, and eliminates contaminants, thereby enhancing water quality and avoiding flooding. 

Deepening waterways: The natural accumulation of sediment lowers the water’s depth. By removing this silt, dredging lowers the risk of flooding and ensures safe travel.

Cleaning ponds and lagoons: Dredging revitalises these stagnant water bodies, enhancing their quality and getting rid of unpleasant odours by clearing out collected silt.

Next time you see a ship passing by, remember the role of dredging. APSEZ will continue to be the pillar that keeps India’s ports open and trade moving freely as the country’s marine landscape changes.

Since water makes up about 70% of our planet, it is natural to assume that it will always be abundant. But freshwater, which we use to drink, bathe, and irrigate our farms, is extremely scarce. Freshwater makes up just 3% of the world’s total water, and two-thirds of it is hidden beneath frozen glaciers or is otherwise unusable.

Because of this, 1.1 billion people globally do not have access to clean water, and 2.7 billion experience water scarcity for at least one month of the year. For 2.4 billion people, inadequate sanitation poses a problem as well since it exposes them to water-borne illnesses like cholera and typhoid fever.

The fact that water is necessary for life on Earth makes it a valuable resource. It is utilised in both industrial and home settings for drinking, cooking, cleaning, bathing, and irrigation. In addition, the production of food and energy, the wellbeing of ecosystems, and human survival all depend on water. Additionally, it is the vital connection between the environment and civilization, providing the framework for both climate change adaptation and sustainable growth.

The sad part is aquifers, rivers, and lakes are drying up or being too contaminated to be used. Over 50% of the wetlands on Earth have vanished. Numerous water systems that support vibrant ecosystems and provide food for an expanding human population are under stress. More water is used in agriculture than in any other sector, and a large portion of that is wasted due to inefficiencies.

The Adani Group has chosen to concentrate on this sector in light of the nation’s acute need for increased capacity in the water infrastructure. By accepting the coveted Prayagraj wastewater treatment, recycling, and reuse project under the National Mission for Clean Ganga Framework, the Group has already taken a significant step forward.

Water continues to be essential to our efforts for sustainable development. As worries about the availability and supply of water resources increase, policymakers are concentrating on infrastructure initiatives that support water resource conservation. We plan to construct new sewage treatment plants (STPs) and renovate the ones that already exist. In addition, we pay close attention to changes in the fields of large-scale water supply and distribution projects, desalination projects, and irrigation infrastructure development to generate potable water for domestic or commercial use.

Furthermore, the Group will investigate opportunities in the desalination water space, where projects for the desalination of seawater and brackish water shall be taken up to produce potable water for the general public and industrial purposes.

Let’s all do our bit to ensure a water-wise future. Remember that every drop counts!

Remember how our mothers and grandmothers used to store spices, lentils and groceries in those ubiquitous plastic or glass jars that were never taken off the kitchen shelves until they broke? Or the clothes that would be handed down to younger siblings and cousins until they were worn out. Recycling is in India’s DNA. We reuse and repurpose anything and everything that has value.   

Reusing and repurposing material not just reduces demand but also saves the energy required to process it. Copper is one such material. One way to obtain it is through mining, another is recycling. Yet another way is using smelters.

As the demand for power increases globally, the need for copper is significant as it is a very important component in energy transition. Mining of copper can be energy intensive and there lies the challenge. However, copper can also be recycled. It can be extracted from goods that have copper, goods that have been thrown away or are being disposed of – refrigerators, stoves, and air conditioners are great sources of copper as they require a larger power supply and, therefore, tend to contain thick insulated copper wire. It is very easy to convert that copper for use in making new products. This concept is called urban mining.

Urban mining and smelting are different processes but involve recovery of industrial and rare metals from scrap and ore. According to a study, ‘Urban mining of precious metals via oxidizing copper smelting’, both approaches use similar steps, starting from the collection or mining of primary or secondary resources, followed by their treatment to provide an appropriate feed mix for pyrometallurgical (pyrometallurgy is a conventional process to recover non-ferrous and precious metals from electronic waste) processing. The study states,  “The mineral processing of copper ore typically includes comminution (breaking into fine particles) and froth flotation steps, whereas the mechanical processing in secondary route includes different sorting, dismantling and mechanical separation processes.”

The complexities of India’s copper landscape – covering mining, production, end-of-life scrap generation, and recycling – has been explained in the “stock and flow model” of the International Copper Association India (ICA-India) and the Fraunhofer Institute, Germany. “India boasts of one of the highest recycling rates (proportion of end-of-life copper scrap that gets recycled and reintroduced into the system) globally, ranging from an impressive 95.1 per cent to 99.4 per cent. This can be attributed to the high collection efficiency of discarded copper, the recognition of copper’s high value across the entire value chain, and minimal copper loss during the remelting process,” says the ICA-India study.

Having said that, the demand for copper is expected to increase due to growth drivers like renewable energy and electric vehicles. India’s drive towards clean energy systems, electric vehicles and a host of associated applications is expected to double domestic copper demand by 2030. In line with the Government of India’s vision of ‘Make in India’, Adani Group’s Kutch Copper Ltd (KCL) is building a 1 million tonne per annum (MTPA) capacity copper complex at Mundra in Gujarat. When completed, this would be the world’s largest single location copper smelting complex, producing enough copper to reduce India’s dependence on imports.

Currently, the country’s imports exceed its exports. According to government data, India imported 1,81,000 tonnes of copper in 2023 whereas the export figure was a dismal 30,000 tonnes. The data suggests that India consumed around 7,50,000 tonnes of copper last fiscal. This number is likely to increase to 1.7 million tonnes by 2027 due to high demand from the green energy industry.

Copper is a truly circular material that can be recycled over and over again with no loss of physical properties. With a global shift towards renewable resources and decarbonization, it will play a key role in sustainable development. So, we must make sure that copper is sustainable in the long term; it is sustainable economically; and it sustains the environment and communities, so that it doesn’t put a strain on society and human relationships.