In order to do this, companies will have to begin treating technology as an extension of the environment. ISO 9000, which recognised quality and training, is fast giving way to ISO 14000, which judges on the basis of the overall efforts/intentions of a company in minimising harm to the environment.

The Mathura Refinery is the first in Asia -- and the third in the world -- to have won the ISO 14001 Certified Environment Management System award. The Mathura Refinery was also recently awarded the 1998 Golden Peacock Award for Environment Awareness, along with the Gujarat Refinery. The Golden Peacock Award for Environmental Awareness was instituted by theInstitute of Directors (IOD).

Mathura Refinery has encouraged school children to plant one lakh trees in Agra, thus providing a natural cover to the Taj Mahal, which is a World Heritage Site. Furthermore, the refinery has its own effluent treatment plant. While the treated effluent is used by farmers for irrigation, the plant itself has been developed into a mini bird sanctuary, with annual surveys conducted by the Bombay Natural History Society.

The refinery has also adopted 10 villages around it. These villages have been provided with clean drinking water, good roads and healthcare programmes, which include family planning and eye camps and a 50-bed hospital. They also operate two mobile dispensaries. Mathura Refinery spends about Rs 30 lakh per annum on basic amenities for these villages.

While the Mathura Refinery has been using natural gas for some time now, projects in the pipeline include a low sulphur diesel and lead free petrol, as also a Rs 1,041 crore project for reducing sulphuremissions.

The Gujarat Refinery, which was commissioned in 1965 and the co-recipient of the 1998 Golden Peacock Award, has a full-fledged waste water treatment plant, as also an effluent treatment facility with chemical and biological systems. The treated water is re-used in the refinery's cooling network as also the fire water network. While emissions from the refinery stack are regularly monitored with continuous analysers, energy conservation measures such as optimisation of heat exchanger trains have resulted in a considerable reduction in emissions.

Safety in a petroleum refinery cannot be stressed enough, and special procedures for maintenance in sensitive areas are practised religiously at the Gujarat Refinery. Close circuit TVs are placed at strategic locations around the plant. There is a 24-hour control room and two well-equipped fire stations, which are being further upgraded. Mock fire drills are carried out on a monthly basis.

Gujarat Refinery is the first in India to have mounded bulletsfor safer LPG storage. In fact, the refinery's uncompromising attitude toward safety measures has twice won it the Sword of Honor, the most prestigious award in industrial safety instituted by the British Safety Council.

In July 1977, the Refinery was selected for ISO 14001 certification by DNV, of the Netherlands. This is a series of International Environmental Management System standards recently introduced to improve environmental protection and performance. While Gujarat Refinery indulges in the mandatory tree planting and landscaping around its plant, they have also undertaken a small scale project for the disposal of oil sludges through experimental land farming.

More importantly, the refinery conducts regular medical examinations of its workers exposed to hazardous environmental conditions, and it has set up an Occupational Health Care Centre at a cost of Rs 56 lakh.