To plant trees and reduce hydrocarbon footprint: TAIF-NK’s environmental policy
It is hard to imagine a person’s modern life without the oil refining sector. Thanks to it we have diesel and motor fuel, mazut, kerosene, hydrocarbon oils — everything that drives the economy forward. Refining products are used almost in all sectors of the industry. But the other side of the coin is that not only people’s well-being but also the environment depends on large enterprises. For TAIF-NK JSC, the care about nature has always been among priority tasks: the company implements environmental programmes aimed to protect the air, water and soil. The enterprise’s employees annually plant trees, do clean-ups in the city streets, participate in environmental campaigns. Read in Realnoe Vremya’s report how TAIF-NK JSC keeps the environmental balance and works to reduce the manmade impact on the environment.
Blue spruces are a very valuable tree species
TAIF-NK JSC is called one of socially oriented enterprises of Tatarstan. The reduction of the negative environmental impact and minimisation of environmental risks are given pride of place here. The company modernises plants, gradually reduces the amount of harmful emissions, implements effective energy saving programmes and improves territories.
TAIF-NK JSC pays special attention to planting forests and reducing the hydrocarbon footprint. In October, the employees of the enterprises went out altogether to plant trees. TAIF-NK JSC came to improve the territory of the N. Lemayev Square with their families. Blue spruce seedlings appeared at the main city square of Nizhnekamsk.
Electrician of Petrol Plant of TAIF-NK JSC Artur Valiyev came to make his contribution to greening the city too. According to him, he gains pleasure from tree planting. Earlier, he had already planted seedlings in the garden and in the courtyard of his house.
“You plant a tree and made almost an eternal investment in the future, immortalise yourself and simply did a good thing — you care about the health of future generations. I am very glad there is such an opportunity,” said Artur Valiyev.
Blue spruce seedlings weren’t chosen accidentally. It is a very valuable tree species. Besides the aesthetic beauty, the spruces don’t change colour throughout the year and amazingly do their environmental task. The company was lucky to have such good weather: experienced ecologists say that rainy weather is the most favourable time for spruces to strike root.
To make sure the seedlings grow well and develop, the employees of the enterprise dug good planting holes. A layer of drainage was poured at the bottom of the hole.
“We prepared about 40 to 40 holes first before the planting. The survival rate will be high,” Director of the Environmental Protection Department of TAIF-NK JSC Ruslan Valiyev talked about details of the planting.
The Shambazovs family participated in the green campaign too. The granddad, grandma and mum with her kids took shovels. The youngest campaigner just turned a year, and despite his young age the kid willingly helped his family to plant the trees — to put the seedlings into the hole first and then bury it and firmed the soil with his feet.
“Our city is close to industrial enterprises, every planted tree is an investment in the environment. Also, it is memory. We will remember that our tree grows at Nizhnekamsk’s main square. We will come here, care about the seedling so that the little spruce grows big, puffy and beautiful,” said Alfiya Shambazova, the oil refinery’s laboratory worker.
The factory’s veteran Munagir Fakhretdinov joined the tree planting too. He worked in the enterprise from 2001 to 2018. He admits that he misses the staff very much, therefore he came to plant spruces with a great desire.
“I started working with bitumen. I participated in the launch of a visbreaking unit, I recently worked at ELOU unit. I have been a pensioner for nearly four years. When I learnt trees were going to be planted, I decided I should certainly go. Today I have both talked with my colleagues and done a good job,” Munagir Fakhretdinov says with pride.
8-year-old Emil has his “own” blue spruce too. The boy has planted a tree for the first time in his life.
“I have come with my mum today. She works at TAIF-NK. I have planted a young spruce, when I grow up, I will come here and see how big it is,” Emil Khasanshin assures us.
“A tonne of collected wastepaper allows saving 17 trees”
It is noteworthy that some blue spruces were purchased with money raised in wastepaper collection. Paper Battle large-scale campaign took place in the enterprise in April within Environment national project. Its main goal is to unite as many people as possible for an important aim — save the environment, remind the people of the country that paper is a valuable feedstock that can and should be recycled.
Every worker of the enterprise could bring cardboard boxes, notebooks or newspapers. It was decided to spend the money raised in wastepaper collection to buy seedlings for planting. The employees of the company provided 1,200 kg of wastepaper on the first day of the campaign alone. More than 1,500 kg of wastepaper was collected in general.
“Plant a Tree campaign became the next stage where blue spruces bought with money raised in wastepaper collection for recycling were planted at the Lemayev Squaree. Given the fact that a hundred kilogram of wastepaper is a saved tree, the workers of the company made a huge contribution to saving the nature,” says Director of the Environmental Protection Department of TAIF-NK JSC Ruslan Valiyev.
Vice Director of the Executive Committee of Nizhnekamsk Municipal District Rafael Igtisamov who also participated in the environmental campaign thanked the workers of TAIF-NK JSC for their contribution to the environmental well-being of the district.
“The real environmental campaign is evidence of TAIF-NK’s environmental activity. Resource-saving, energy-efficient technologies based on environmental safety are the foundation of sustainable development of the territory in the 21st century. TAIF-NK actively introduces such technologies reducing the negative environmental impact. The campaign is run with money raised in wastepaper collection. I was surprised to know that a tonne of collected wastepaper allows saving 17 trees, 200 tonnes of water, a thousand kilowatt of electrical energy,” noted Rafael Igtisamov.
Reinforcement of “green shield”
Head of the Process Safety and Environmental Protection Department of the Executive Committee of Nizhnekamsk Municipal District Olga Chernyshyova in turn added that TAIF-NK JSC became the first enterprise in Nizhnekamsk to comply with a decree of the Tatarstan Cabinet of Ministers as of 2006 on a list of environmental protection measures in Nizhnekamsk Municipal District.
Workers of the company planted 104,000 seedlings of European spruce and 45,000 seedlings of common oak on an area of 39,2 ha in the sanitary and protection zone of the Nizhnekamsk Industrial Hub near Alan village in 2020 alone. This allowed reinforcing the “green shield” of Nizhnekamsk that will protect the population from the negative impact of the industrial zone.
Agrotechnical tending has been provided with for five years now to improve the conditions of root nutrition, better survival, preservation and rapid growth of the seedlings.
“The decree of the Tatarstan Cabinet of Ministers envisages that trees will be planted in the sanitary and protection zone of the Nizhnekamsk Industrial Hub on an area of more than 1,000 ha. TAIF-NK was one of the first to meet its commitments and worked on an area of about 400 ha. TAIF-NK is characterised an environment-oriented enterprise, they always participate in all environmental measures,” notes head of the Process Safety and Environmental Protection Department of the Executive Committee of Nizhnekamsk Municipal District Olga Chernyshyova.
Also, in accordance with the Environment national project, TAIF-NK JSC annually takes a series of measures aimed to prevent the negative environmental impact. Every worker of the enterprise is somehow involved in environmental protection starting with conscious waste collection in the workplace to the involvement in the environmental campaigns that are held.
“As a socially oriented enterprise TAIF-NK company always supports different republican and urban campaigns. Our enterprise has a special attitude to environmental measures. We participate in urban clean-ups, by the way, an environmental bimonthly campaign is now held when we have been improving a territory we were assigned for the second week. We are actively involved in riverbank clean-ups, clean and restore springs and today we are planting blue spruces at the Lemayev Square. I want to emphasise TAIF-NK company’s asset because precisely they initiate and very actively participate in different events,” says aide to the director general in general affairs Vladimir Gatyunok.
The workers of the enterprise recently did a clean-up on Lesnaya Street for a week. More than 70 people cleaned the territory up, seven pieces of machinery arrived to help them. The TAIF-NK workers collected more than 10 KAMAZ lorries of dead leaves for seven days — the collected waste was transported to a special site. The work in the open air provided everybody with joy and pleasure.
“We always clean our favourite city with a great mood. It is very pleasant to make our contribution to the cleanliness of urban streets. Collective work brings people together, provides positive emotions,” notes Yelena Guryanova, a Sales Department manager at TAIF-NK JSC.
The employees of TAIF-NK JSC tell the younger generation about why it is necessary to care about the environment. Ecologists of the enterprise regularly deliver ecology classes in schools. Thanks to such meetings, children have an opportunity to learn more information about the benefit of separate waste collection and waste recycling.
Environmental responsibility for TAIF-NK JSC is a mechanism of sustainable development. The company annually takes a series of measures to prevent the environmental impact, negative consequences of the enterprise’s activity.
Thanks to the renovation of a local biological industrial sewage treatment shop, TAIF-NK JSC doesn’t use river water — the biological treatment facilities operate in a complete water circulation cycle. The local biological treatment facilities of TAIF-NK JSC opened in 2017. The water treatment rate is 99,99%.
To significantly reduce emissions into the air, the company implements a large-scale environment programme named Clean Air. Obsolete burners were replaced in facilities of TAIF-NK JSC from 2016 to 2021. The company fully refused liquid fuel in furnaces. Emissions into all flares went down, exhaust gas started to be reused. Steaming during the preparation for major repairs is now shut in.
This year, there have been taken measures to transfer hydrocarbon gases to the oil refinery’s own fuel system, which allowed reducing the amount of by-product gases burnt in the flare, lowering natural gas consumption for fixed combustion, thus decreases the emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
TAIF-NK JSC has repeatedly confirmed the status of environmentally responsible enterprise with victories in Russian environmental contests. The company is a repeated laureate of 100 Best Organisations of Russia. Environment and Environmental Management competition. Last year, TAIF-NK JSC won ECOleader republican competition.