Air Liquide shows the way

The chemicals industry is potentially missing out on €1billion ($1.4bn, £909million) per company by failing to improve its sustainability performance, says a new report.

Research by Northern Ireland’s Queen’s University Management School in Belfast suggests that if chemicals companies improved sustainability performance they would create ‘sustainable value’ by using existing resources more efficiently than the market average.

The research quantifies how efficient the largest companies are at using resources. Of the nine companies, the French gas group Air Liquide was the most efficient, on average using resources 1.7 times more efficiently than its competitors. BASF and Bayer were also classed as relatively efficient – up to five times more than some companies.

Dow Chemical, on the other hand, used its resources only half as efficiently as its competitors, and was estimated to have lost €2.2bn in ‘sustainable value’.

The resources assessed included water use, organic compounds, hazardous waste creation and greenhouse gas emissions. The analysis is based on financial, environmental and social data published by the companies themselves.