Mahajan Overseas – a Panipat-based home furnishings manufacturer and exporter, has reset the frontiers for the rest of the home furnishings industry with its 4-acre green factory at Barhi Industrial Area/Textile Park (Sonipat). The factory’s mammoth façade, representative of the Mahajan Group’s pioneering sustainability efforts, rises in a pleasant contrast to its surroundings. Currently housing 60 machines, the building occupies 1.5 acres of the total area. Eventually, the production operations for cutting, sewing, finishing and packing for the entire Group will be consolidated on this very plot. Team StitchWorld recently visited the new unit to witness first-hand the grandeur of a sustainable premise in the making. In conversation with our team, Pranab Mahajan, Director, Mahajan Overseas details the project.
Awaiting audits for Silver LEED Certificate, the journey towards a green factory commenced for Pranab from the word go. “You cannot expect that a factory will be able to match your sustainability goals once it is operational. Right from the genesis of the idea to its execution and sustaining the concept throughout the lifetime of the factory, one has to ensure that the premises are in harmony with the green principles,” remarks Pranab. “However, the challenge and the checklist to go with it is mammoth. From sourcing of building material from the nearby places, to explaining the concept to the labourers during the construction was really difficult,” he is quick to add. For instance, when the factory was being constructed, care was taken to ensure that the construction had minimum impact on the surroundings. Hence, every vehicle coming into the unit with construction material, required washing of its tyres when it moved out of the premises to prevent it from carrying any loose soil from the site. Care has been taken to ensure that no scrap material or construction waste (tiles, stones, sheets, pipes etc.) ended up in the landfill. Maximum usage of wastage was ensured during the construction but it does not reflect in the final building as the waste has been used creatively, be it the electricity poles, roof of the parking space, railings or mosaic tiling of the walkways using the debris of stone and tiles.
“You cannot expect that a factory will be able to match your sustainability goals once it is operational. Right from the genesis of the idea to its execution and sustaining the concept throughout the lifetime of the factory, one has to ensure that the premises are in harmony with the green principles.” – Pranab Mahajan, Director, Mahajan Overseas
The core areas which Pranab has focused on are – developing organic HVAC systems, soil conservation, scrap conservation and water conservation. Inadvertently, these principles have altered the structural design of the facility in simplistically astute ways. An acre long garden which is almost 6 feet deep from the ground level has been developed at the entrance of the factory. This garden, which is now a source of rain water harvesting, previously catered to the soil requirements during construction – gardening, paving the base of the building, etc. The garden’s trough area also helps create an area of high wind flow. A water body runs parallel to the length of the building in the area between the garden and the building. The aforementioned high wind flow gets cooled to a breeze above this water body. There are suction devices on one side of the water body, which direct the breeze into the building keeping it naturally cool even in peak summers. Cool air is sucked in from one side and hot air exited from the rear side of the building through a set of exhaust fans. The factory has four floors (ground to third) and there are 18 suction devices installed on each floor which pull cool air above the water body into the factory. White ceramic tiles have been used on the roof to reflect the sun’s heat.
The façade and the rear wall of the factory are composed of 16 mm micro honey beam polycarbonate sheets which allows only the sunlight to pass through, blocking the heat. The sheets further help maintain the temperature on the production floor. Owing to these sheets, the factory does not require artificial lighting during the day, except for areas with inspection tables. With this, the company’s energy bills are 25 per cent less than the expenses it would have borne without regulating the amount of heat entering the building. The factory has a provision of artificial lighting for rainy and cloudy days. The factory’s pathways are slightly inclined to ensure that water is directed to rain water harvesting inlets at the base of the building which connect to the underground water harvesting tank. “Barring the water from urinals and Water Closets, we are harvesting and recycling every possible drop of water in our premises,” Pranab shares. Another ongoing initiative to compliment the water conservation agenda has commenced already. Soon the factory will also be recycling the steam condensate from the boilers.
Phase one of the company’s expansions is over and now there are ambitious plans to make two more buildings in the existing topography, but when, depends on business conditions and will take time.
In the meanwhile green initiatives are to continue and the team at Mahajan Overseas is now working on a study of thermal conservation of the heat within the working condition of the premises, where an air-conditioned building in a similar topography is chosen as a benchmark to compare the cooling of the natural HVAC system they have with that of an artificial system. The results will quantify how well the factory’s existing HVAC system has been able to create comfortable working conditions on the production floor as compared to conventional air-conditioning. “Wind and water circulation keeps the temperature around 30 to 32 degrees Celsius. The final figures will come from thermal study,” Pranab shares. Similarly the company is now looking at adding solar panels in the same premises and for that discussions are already in progress.
65% of water being used for landscape irrigation is from in-house filtration plant, treated from toilet washbasin water.
85% of the material used in the construction of the factory was sourced locally.
The commitment to go for a sustainable factory requires a vision, as a green factory costs almost 1.5 times more as compared to a regular one, but it saves 25 per cent on electricity bills – an equation not everyone understands or appreciates. “Almost 4 years ago when we thought about expansion and putting up a new factory, we felt why not have something different to stay ahead of the time, a difference that would give us satisfaction as well as advantage over the others. And when we looked around and saw the fast developments happening on the global front regarding environment, we decided for a green factory and now many of our buyers who have visited here have actually increased the quantum of work,” shares Pranab, adding that in coming years even Indian customers will be more aware about such things and their brand ‘Maspar’ already doing good business will grow more due to the green advantage.
While many home furnishing companies in Pranab’s circle appreciate the initiative, but as of now no one has come forward to follow suite. He is confident that the future lies in this direction and once the market conditions are more conducive, some more companies may take the plunge. Having its head office in Panipat, Mahajan Overseas is ISO 9002 certified and Sedex approved, and is now working towards getting an SA 14000 certification as well. With an annual business of US $ 60 million, the company is mainly catering to European buyers and this year it is expecting at least 10 per cent growth despite all challenges of working in Europe. Its customer profile includes top buyers like M&S and it is also looking for new clients in the US and Middle East.
