ACC Cements Wadi

WADI CEMENT WORKS, GULBARGA, KARNATAKA:
The wadi cement works at ACC was setup in the year 1968 with an installed capacity of 2.5 million ton per annum of ordinary Portland cement clinker. The current capacity after the commissioning of new plant is 5.20 million ton per annum. The factory is situated at the south-central part of the country in the state of Karnataka. It is well connected by rail and road. The nearest important railway junction, wadi, is one the central railway between Solapur and Gurmitkal. Wadi station is about 1 kilometer from the plant site. The plant machineries were originally supplied by M/s. Taylor and M/s. ABL and later have been renovated and upgrade over the years.

Geographically the site extends from East longitude 76 degree 4.5 inches. The nearest village is Wadi at a distance of about 1.5 km from the site on East-south-East direction. The existing colony of ACC Wadi is at a distance of about 1.2 km East of the site. The nearest railway station is Wadi at adistance of about 1.5 km. Wadi is a main railway junction on the broad guage line, connecting Wadi with Mumbai, Hyderabad, and Bangalore.

Wadi Cement works manufacture ordinary Portland cement type-43,53 grade (latest version of IS: 269,IS: 8112 and IS:12269

respectively) and Portland Pozoolona cement (latest version of IS:1489 part-1) under the brand name ACC SURAKSHA which makes fluorspar of fly ash upto 25percent thereby helping in maintaining pollution free environment.

In this plant, manufacturing of cement is based on “dry process”. The first step is to form, clinker from a fine ground mixture of calcareous and siliceous material with a small amount of fluxing material, which is heated at high temperature. In the second step, the formed clinker is ground with gypsum to form ordinary Portland cement. Various additives like pozzolona; fly ash etc may be added at this stage to produce Portland pozoolona cement.

Various raw materials like limestone, shale, iron ore, gypsum, calcinated clay, and fly ash are being used in this plant. Limestone is received from captive mines, located at Wadi. The limestone is fragmented by blasting with explosive. It is then loaded into35/50 tons dumpers with the help of shovels. The dumpers transport the limestone to the crusher, which is located at about1.5 km distance from the quarry face. In the crusher the limestone is crushed to 20 mm size. Then it is transported to the factory through a series of conveyer belts. Shale, iron and limestone are mixed in optimum required proportion and thoroughly homogenized pneumatically in blending silos after grinding the same in raw mills to the required fineness. This fine powdered material called “raw meal” is stored in storage silos from where it is pumped to preheated system where it gets calcined and then enters into the klin.

This material is burnt at 14500 C to produce an intermediate product known as clinker, in which pulverized coal is used as a fuel. Clinker is then cooled in cooler and sent to clinker storage gantry. From the gantry, it is sent to cement mills, where it is mixed with optimum quantity of gypsum and ground to the specified fineness to produce ordinary Portland cement. For manufacturing Portland Pozzolona Cement (PPC), clinker, pozzolona (CCP & fly ash) and gypsum are ground to specified fineness in optimum proportion to produce PPC. Produced cement is stored in silos, from where it is packed in bags with the help of rotary packers. The plants are fitted with electrostatic precipitators and Baby filters to control dust emission.

WADI THE PLACE:
Wadi is a small town in the Gulbarga district of Karnataka and has only recently become a municipal area. It is suitably situated at a distance of about 40 km from the district headquarters-Gulbarga and at distance of about 200 km from Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh, Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore also is only a night’s journey away. The only major centers, which are relatively inaccessible from Wadi, are New Delhi and Kolkata, with journey times in excess of 30 hours.

Wadi is a small place and the places of major interest are the ACC plants and colony themselves and the wadi railway station which is a junction. The rest of wadi is rough terrain. The level of education is fairly good in main wadi but it is poor in the surrounding villages. Health and hygiene and drinking water are major concerns of the people. The region is a limestone rich belt leading to the establishment of other cement units and ancillary industries.

EMPLOYMENT PROFILE:
Wadi works directly or indirectly provides livelihood to 10000 people. It employees about 1600 people as permanent employees and about 500-800 as contract labour. In addition there are people working as Transporter, Drivers, and Cooks etc. Apart from these there are a large number of businesses flourishing on account of ACC-these are as diverse as Tailoring to pan shops to STD booths, etc.