Chemical giant Dow’s journey to net zero

This scorching hot summer is another reminder that the effects of climate change are upon us, and there is no time to waste in reducing CO2 emissions across the planet. Dow is among the global companies rapidly increasing their efforts to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement, most notably aiming to get to net zero by 2050.

Net zero: Dow’s journey to becoming a carbon sink is the first webinar in the new series “Sustainability in action: real world examples for a greener future,” and it features Matthijs Ruitenbeek, Senior scientist, sustainable carbon cycles at Dow, sharing his company’s strategies and initiatives on the road to carbon neutrality.

“Overall, our company wants to deliver value to the customers with best-in-class performance, and that is not only financial performance, that includes also our environmental footprint,” said Ruitenbeek, outlining Dow’s strategic focus areas of climate protection, circular economy and safer materials. Dow is committed to making safe, quality materials, but also wants to ensure that they come with a minimum CO2 footprint and with the lowest possible amount of waste. They are very active in the energy transition and feedstock transition, seeking better alternatives.

Dow looks at all parts of the value chain, finding ways to reduce emissions from its own manufacturing processes and energy sourcing, while also looking downstream to when carbon-based products often end up in landfills.

“What can we do to manage the end of life?” he asks. “That is not only about the collecting and sorting of waste, but that also includes the design for recycling and making sure that we have the highest probability of getting the carbon back into the loop.”

There is a need to regularly rethink and reformulate plans around sustainability, and Dow tends to publish sustainability plans over 10 year periods. Earlier plans have focused on assessing the company’s own emissions and have emphasized how the company can help its customers make their products and processes more sustainable. Currently, they’re thinking ahead.

“The 2025 goals are more about blueprinting,” said Ruitenbeek. “What does society look like in 2050, and what do we need to get there? We have to rethink our business models and collaborate to make that happen. We all know that the IPCC has recently published that we aren’t doing that good on the planet with respect to the Paris goals, so how can we accelerate?”

Current targets that Dow has committed to as a part of its sustainability plan include:

• Reduce net annual carbon emissions by 5 million metric tons by 2030
• Enable 3 million metric tons of plastic to be collected, reused or recycled through its direct actions and partnerships by 2030
• Enable 100% of Dow products sold into packaging applications to be reusable or recyclable by 2035
• Dow intends to be carbon neutral by 2050

Both short and long-term goals are integral to a sustainability strategy, which must move step-by-step based on factors like current technological capabilities and cost feasibility.

Dow has many projects both planned and in motion to help reach its net zero goals, including a small nuclear power collaboration with X-energy. Dow is also establishing a new site in Alberta, Canada that will be completely carbon neutral by the end of this decade. Ruitenbeek reported that the Alberta site will enable the company to “decarbonize around 20% of our global ethylene production with an expansion capacity of around 15%.”

Can these initiatives get Dow to its ultimate goal of a 100% emissions reduction? Ruitenbeek says not on their own, but there are still-developing technologies that he thinks might be the key. “One of the things that might get us there is e-cracking, where we are developing electrical furnaces that use renewable energy instead of the current fossil carbon combustion,” he explained. “That should be able to dramatically improve the CO2 footprint of our steam cracker assets. All over the world we have 16 or 17 crackers, and those are major emitters of CO2 because of carbon fuel burning.”

Among the five largest polyethylene producers in the world, Dow has to contend with plastic’s environmental impact. Ruitenbeek pointed out that plastic has a lower CO2 footprint when you consider the impact of its production and transportation compared to other materials like metal and paper. However, plastic waste is a significant problem.

“Other materials have a higher recycling capability, and that makes them, from a circularity perspective at this moment, still more attractive,” he said. That is why Dow is involved with many initiatives that include working with their customers, brands and packaging companies to find solutions. These include everything from supporting innovative solutions (like the RENUVA program, which converts used mattresses to raw materials) to working with a brand like Crocs to reduce the CO2 impact of its manufacturing processes.

“We have committed to make sure that 3 million metric tons of plastics will not end up in landfills or, worse, in the ocean,” said Ruitenbeek, “by collecting, reusing, and recycling via in-house developments, via partnerships, and via collective actions like the Alliance to end waste plastics.”

Collaborations of all kinds are absolutely critical for the industry to meet net zero goals.

“There is a lot happening outside that is relevant and a lot of people with capabilities and skills that we do not have in-house, so we need to collaborate,” said Ruitenbeek. “I’m in the R&D function, and there we have the responsibility to scout and monitor new developments. One of the ways to do that is by literature and patents. We use Elsevier as one of the service providers in that space,” he noted.

Watch the full webinar Net zero: Dow’s journey to become a carbon sink – and stay tuned for future webinars in the “Sustainability in Action” series!

Follow Elsevier for Engineering on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter here.

#NetZero #Sustainability #CarbonNeutral #Engineering

?

?