MONHEIM AM RHEIN, Germany — OQ Chemicals introduced a company-wide sustainability program during the AFPM International Petrochemical Conference in San Antonio, Texas, in March. With the main aim of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the program, called “reduce,” has set clear goals for OQ Chemicals to become climate-neutral until the middle of the century.

“In 2019, we started to systematically question our existing approaches. Now we are taking decisive action to raise sustainability and future competitiveness of our company,” said Oliver Borgmeier, CEO of OQ Chemicals. “With ‘reduce,’ we are tackling the challenge to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions drastically over the coming years with a strategic, company-wide, and fully comprehensive program. Our goal is clear: to become a climate-neutral company until mid of the century, meaning until 2050 - or even before.” 

Christoph Balzarek, EVP Corporate Development at OQ Chemicals and global program lead for “reduce,” explained, “This program is the result of a process started already years ago, bundling all our activities under one roof. It represents both a very structured approach and a clear roadmap towards our goal of climate neutrality.”

“While this long-term goal is around two decades in the future, we are already in the middle of implementing it,” Balzarek added. “Concrete measures for the next years are clearly defined, and intermediate targets are in sight. With the year 2017 being the baseline, OQ Chemicals will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 18% until 2025, and by 30% until 2030.”

EFESO Consulting, an international group specializing in operations strategy and performance improvement, is supporting OQ Chemicals in this initiative. Marcia De Troyer, Vice President at EFESO, said, “All along the global value chain, chemical companies are defining their way to climate neutrality. In this environment, we regard ‘reduce’ as a very much structured, detailed, and thus effective program. As a goal, ‘mid of century’ first sounds vague, but with such a structured and pragmatic approach that OQ Chemicals is pursuing, we consider the goal of climate neutrality to be reached earlier than the year 2050.”

The “reduce” program is based on the standards of Greenhouse Gas Protocol and concerns direct emissions from production activities (Scope 1), emissions based on energy consumption (Scope 2), as well as indirect emissions of OQ Chemicals, for example associated with raw materials, processing, transportation, and marketing of the products, as well as leased assets, purchased goods and services (Scope 3).

The program covers all emission-relevant aspects of the company from supply chain and procurement through operations to marketing and sales. It includes all production sites of the company, with the focus first on the main ones at Oberhausen, Germany, and Bay City, Texas; the former being subject to Emission Trading System (ETS) of the European Union. The “reduce” program consists of seven working streams, including a “breakthrough” working stream for innovation strategy and processes that helps to also identify technology leaps and drive successful pilots.

For more information about OQ Chemicals, visit www.chemicals.oq.com.