Ford India’s Sustainable Strategy: A Green Step in the Right Direction

The development of a nation’s economy and more comfortable lifestyles of the people of that nation go hand in hand. Economic development at the outset, is thus a required transition. However, enormous population growth worldwide in the second half of the twentieth century has aggravated the factors that threaten human health as well as the health of the Planet. Ozone depletion, climate change, depleting natural resources and extensive loss of biodiversity and habitat are all a direct result of the aforementioned. A key solution to all these problems is sustainable development. And it is indeed the corporate houses, who have the resources and the incentive, to adopt practices which cause minimal negative impact on the global or local environment. This World Environment Day, we bring you the initiatives and efforts being taken by Ford India towards ensuring a sustainable future via its various green practices.

Ford India has been relentlessly implementing green practices in its Chennai Plant. It  has been able to re-use 100% of the waste water generated in the plant, enabled a 30% reduction in water consumption per car production in the past three years and has reduced electricity consumption per car by 10%. In the same plant, 100% of the hazardous waste generated is either recycled or co-processed in the cement industries. This makes the Ford India plant a zero landfill and waste emission plant. Ford India has also come up with a new environment friendly paint through the Three-Wet High-Solids paint technology, which is first of it’s kind in India. In fact, Ford India’s Chennai plant is the first Ford car plant in the world – and Ford is the only manufacturer in India – to use new the Three-Wet High-Solids paint technology. Automated robots apply all three coats – primer, base coat and clear coat – one on top of another before oven curing. The plant also enables heat recovery by utilizing exhaust heat air to heat fresh air through the Heat exchanger in Topcoat oven and E coat ovens. Propane gas has been introduced as a fuel in the ovens instead of diesel, making for an environment-friendly paint process.

These active measures taken by Ford India has resulted in great benefits like reduction in CO2 emission by 21%, VOC emission reduction by 60% and water consumption reduction by 15,000 KL/annum. The most recent green invention by Ford, that will be made available in India, is the soon to be launched EcoSport, a 1.0 L EcoBoost engine. The integration of three advanced technologies (namely turbocharging, direct injection and Ti-VCT) into the EcoBoost has ensured significant customer benefits like optimized engine efficiency (saving 20% of the fuel and reducing CO2 emissions by 15% in comparison to gasoline engines), superior driving performances and advantages of small displacement. The 1.0L EcoBoost engine has been unanimously named the ‘2012 International Engine of the Year’ by 76 global journalists.

Ford India plans to continue working towards ensuring corporate greening. The Company aims to reduce 25% of the energy usage per vehicle, which will help reduce the carbon footprint of every buyer. In making these initiatives, Ford India has shown that even when economic development and industrialization is threatening the world with evils like global warming and climate change, there is a proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. Corporate have to simply always keep in mind the principles and ethos of sustainable development. Let us progress, but keeping the future generations in mind. Way to go Ford India!