During the emg Pre-K press conference, held in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 15-16 June, Andrea Brown, Director Global Sustainability for LyondellBasell, discussed how sustainability and circular economy can go beyond possible through collaboration.
Chemical industry leader LyondellBasell produces materials for everyday use, with applications in the packaging, automotive, electronics and healthcare industries. Its products are sold in more than 100 countries around the world and it manufactures in more than 20 different sites. The largest producer of PE and PP in Europe, and the second largest producer of PO worldwide, LyondellBasell’s products, according to Brown, are already “helping to enable sustainability”.
LyondellBasell takes the theme ‘Advancing Possible’ as its theme for K
Andrea Brown, Director Global Sustainability, LyondellBasell
“When we think about achieving the UN’s sustainable development goals or the net zero transition,” she added, “we believe that our products are absolutely critical to helping enable that transition to a sustainable future.”
LyondellBasell products going into food packaging, for example, are helping to keep food fresh for longer and helping to avoid the environmental impact from food waste. They can also be found in electric vehicles for their lightweighting qualities and helping to create a much longer performance range, thus generating better value. They’re can also be found in sustainable living products and supporting innovations in the renewable energy sector through solar panels and casings, as well as wind turbines.
Finally, they’re used in the healthcare industry where the benefits of plastics-based products have shown their worth in terms of hygiene and healthcare over the course of the Coronavirus pandemic.
“We've been much more vocal in terms of how we view our opportunity to address some of the world's biggest challenges,” Brown added, “including ending plastic waste, addressing climate change, and supporting a thriving society. We've come up with a number of ambitious goals that we will aim to achieve over the course of the next decade, starting with ending plastic waste where we aim to produce and market two million metric tonnes of recycled and renewable-based polymers annually by 2030.”
Catalytic capital
Brown then went on to discuss the ‘catalytic capital’ of LyondellBasell, which will be essential to creating new financing models that can help address the challenge of plastic waste. By example, she said that for every dollar invested in venture funds, the company could help catalyse a further five dollars from co-investors.
The commitment to zero pellet loss continues to be extremely important for Brown and LyondellBasell. Its goal of zero plastic pellets lost from its facilities leaking into the environment continues to be a strong focus for the company under its collaboration with Operation Clean Sweep.
When it comes to addressing climate change, the goal of LyondellBasell is to be net zero in terms of greenhouse gas emissions from its operations by 2050, with a key milestone of 2030 when it will aim to reduce emissions by 30 per cent – again from its own operations – as well as accelerate its use of renewable electricity through a commitment to use a minimum of 50 per cent of its procuring electricity from renewable sources.
“By that date,” Brown elaborated, “as a company with significant reach, we want to continue to support having thriving societies so our commitment to safety continues to be at the heart of our culture. Our commitment to zero incidents, injuries and accidents continues to be core to how we want to operate. We've really stepped up our ambition in diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and we have recently committed to achieving gender parity in senior leadership roles globally over the course of the next decade, as well as increase the number of people from under-represented groups in the US in senior leadership roles to reflect the communities where those roles are operating.”
In agreement with the vast majority of plastics industry experts, Brown believes that plastics will continue to play a key role in society, but plastic waste is a critical challenge that has to be addressed.
“If we don't,” she said, “all of the benefits that plastics offer won't be realised at scale. If we address the problem of plastic waste by moving towards a circular economy, where resources and materials are circulated back into the economy, then we will be able to start to unlock the full value of plastic waste. We are leveraging our expertise in R&D to create innovative solutions and growing our capabilities in both mechanical and advanced recycling, as well as the use of alternative feedstocks. We are very much focused on this concept of catalytic capital and how we can engage with others to pool new financing models that can help unlock different opportunities to address waste management infrastructure and recovery, particularly in the US and Europe.
A collaborative effort
Initiatives such as these require collaboration across the value chain. It's important, Brown added, that it is not undertaken in isolation as no single company can solve such challenges alone: “Collaboration is critical. We've been stepping up in terms of how we collaborate into value chain platforms that can help create scale and address this challenge.”
LyondellBasell is a founder member of the Alliance to End Plastic Waste (AEPW) and partners with the UN Environment Programme in recognition of the urgency of climate change and support of the Paris Climate Agreement. “We believe that net zero climate greenhouse gas emissions will require products and contributions from the plastics and chemical industry and consider our commitment to net zero a credible pathway towards 2030.” This pathway, according to Brown, will also support the climate ambitions of LyondellBasell’s customers’ in helping them reach their own sustainability goals.
“We're going to continue to integrate proven solutions and known technologies to be more efficient and effective as we look towards our 2030 goals,” Brown continued, by which she meant the implementation of energy efficiency technologies, process efficiency improvements and fuel switching, as well as integrating more renewable electricity into its portfolio through power purchase agreements (PPAs).
As the world begins to look beyond 2030, industry is inclined to accelerate the scale-up and deployment of breakthrough technologies that will help decarbonise chemical processes. To do that, policies to integrate climate change into a wider business process will be required. When considering the technological solutions that will be critical towards reaching net zero, Brown stressed the need to understand what novel and low-carbon production processes will be critical in the production of LyondellBasell’s portfolio. “We’re therefore looking at hydrogen and the electrification of crackers,” she concluded, “but we want to make sure that electricity will be sourced from renewable sources. We’re looking at low-carbon steam in order to support the heat requirements that we have, and we’re looking at circular and renewable feedstocks to help move away from virgin fossil feedstocks.”
As industry progresses towards 2050, businesses are pursuing these different technology options that will, in some capacity, continue to form part of solution portfolios as they aim for net zero. The trick is to ensure that what is possible now can be progressed, scaled-up and implemented with efficiency.