Environmental care is one of Kazchrome's top priorities. Our operations are certified according to ISO 14001 international standard and include a comprehensive environmental protection program.
Key areas of the company's environmental activities:
Dust-free air. We have installed modern purification filters and dust collection systems at all production facilities. We regularly improve the landscaping of our territories by planting new trees.
Water conservation. A system of continuous monitoring and wastewater treatment has been introduced. The mines use environmentally safe water disposal technologies.
Responsible waste management. There are programs in place to recycle ferrochrome slag and dust. We are in an ongoing effort to reduce production waste.
Environmental training. All employees are regularly trained in the principles of environmental protections.
Kazchrome's environmental policy complies with the new Environmental Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan, international standards and best international practices. We keep in mind the interests of all stakeholders and continuously improve our environmental management system.
One of the most important issues of Kazchrome's environmental protection program is the recycling of its own waste. Here we have learned to recycle even the dust captured by gas cleaning plants. After all, it still contains valuable raw materials. The dust is used to make sinter or brex, which are then returned to the smelting furnaces. This is how virtually zero-waste production is achieved.
In 2023, a sludge processing plant of the Donskoy Ore Mining and Processing Plant started operation in Khromtau. Each year, the plant will process about 1.7 million tons of permanently generated waste, and what is more important - sludge that has been accumulated earlier.
Sludge is a finely milled refuse from the engineering development of a mining product. The ERG Green concentrator is one of the four projects of a large-scale program to process mature sludge at the Donskoy Ore Mining and Processing Plant. As reported by the company, the project will result in the processing of 14.5 million tons of historically accumulated waste.
Recent major projects include the construction of new gas cleaning systems for two smelting shops at the Aktobe Ferroalloys Plant.
After commissioning of the new facilities, the company's environmental load has been reduced by 30%. Kazchrome spent more than 12 billion tenge on modernization.
The company also made a major step forward in the development of alternative energy by starting the construction of a recovery power plant at the Aktobe Ferroalloys Plant. The main fuel for the new facility will be ferroalloy gas. This is a by-product of ferroalloy smelting. The use of alternative fuel will reduce the consumption of traditional energy carriers and also reduce carbon monoxide emissions into the environment.
The power plant will be built near the fourth smelting shop, which will be the main supplier of fuel and the main consumer of the secondary energy resource. The complex includes a steam power plant consisting of two boiler units and a turbine generator with an installed electrical capacity of up to 80 megawatts.
Ferroalloy by-product gas has already been successfully used at the Aksu Ferroalloys Plant. As part of the renovation of smelting shop No. 6, a unique furnace No. 64 was built here. The modern 81 MVA unit, which has no analogues in the post-Soviet space, is characterized by a number of advanced achievements of the world metal industry. The leakproof design reduces power losses and also completely eliminates undesirable emissions into the atmosphere. The furnace gas cleaning unit with a two-stage filtration system captures and returns to production not only the dust of raw materials, but also all combustible ferroalloy gas generated during the technological process. The latter is used for preheating the raw materials and heating the ladles. These technologies not only increase furnace productivity by an average of 35%, but also significantly reduce electricity consumption by up to 20%.
Environmental protection and sustainable development provisions are stated in the management policy of TNC Kazchrome JSC.
