Sustainability has become a powerful worldwide movement with government, industry and civil society realising that there is no other way, other than putting sustainability principles to work and into action to ensure that future generations are left with enough resources for their comfortable living on earth, that the ill effects of climate change are reversed before it reaches a point of no return and our entire living shifts to using materials that are totally benign to the environment, recyclable with no waste.
Sustainability is moving into wider and wider deployment in industry. What is the plan of action for its effective implementation and how can the results from transition to sustainable operations from each industry and every company be measured. Chemical Industry Digest in this special focus on sustainability in the chemical industry, discusses, debates and articulates the views of CEOs of global MNCs and major chemical companies, premier research organisation and global renewable carbon research and consultancy organisation. Chemical Industry Digest is privileged to obtain the views of Dr Kamlesh Kushalkar, Head, Corporate EHS, Huntsman India. His views are presented here.
Chemical Industry Digest (CID): Sustainability has become a loosely bandied word with many companies using the word sustainability as a promotional word attached to their company brand identity. How can we rid the concept of an arbitrariness and introduce a practical set of matrices to define it clearly? What are its more important components & characteristics, based on which best in class, measurable outcomes can be drawn?
Kamlesh Kushalkar (KK): United Nations defined sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” as well as published the sustainable development goals (SDG) for the stakeholders. The organizations committed to sustainability should evaluate their operations against the applicable SDG and publish their performance annually. Examples of such measurable parameters per unit of production are – energy consumed, CO2 produced, water used, waste generated. The responsible use indicators are renewable raw materials, recycling, reuse, green energy, carbon footprint reduction, etc. The outcome of such disclosures would be e.g. (1) The regulators and financing institutions can evaluate more sustainable organisation based on these sustainability parameters. (2) The conscious consumers can prefer the products if its sustainability parameters are visible on labels.
CID: To put sustainability principles into practice, how should an industry/manufacturing unit go about it? What could be a practical roadmap with a plan of action?
KK: The leadership’s commitment to sustainability is the most important step. The executive team would then define the measurable parameters based on SDG applicable for their operations and ecosystem. The organisation should evaluate not just its own operations, but every step of the value chain including the inputs sources (raw materials, energy, water, labour), the output (products, emissions, waste generation, communities impact) and downstream effects (consumer use, repairs/reuse, recycling and the safe disposal of the end of life materials). Such a life cycle analysis and its cost evaluations would indicate the sustainability index of the organisation in the given ecosystem. The leadership team should choose the focus areas for improvement and provide resources with defined timelines.
Huntsman’s motto is to “Enrich lives through innovation” and deliver solutions that create value in a sustainable way. Our products enable a low-carbon economy and make a positive contribution to society and the environment. Huntsman is committed to the Responsible Care® management principles and has published its Horizon 2025 strategic targets in areas of safety & operational performance, e.g. greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), energy consumption, hazardous waste disposal and net water usage. Huntsman publishes its progress report on sustainability targets annually.
CID: Business and industry are until now modelled on profitability outcomes which override other concerns. So how can corporates transit to the platform of sustainability, from the current mind-set of take – make – and dispose? What would be the net benefits to companies for shifting to sustainability? Would it entail additional costs for its products and services?
KK: The linear concept of ‘take–make–dispose’ has been the mantra of business development and promoting consumerism over the past several decades. Current economic situations and conventional financial models measure the organisation’s performance on a quarterly or annual basis, assuming it would correlate to long-term profitability. Switching over to the circular economy concept of “take-make-reuse-recycle-regenerate”, building a sustainable business and driving responsible consumerism will not happen overnight. It will certainly need systemic changes in the regulatory and financial system. Proactive leadership will embrace sustainability as new business opportunities and build a positive mind-set for the circularity in their value chain. While the regulatory push and consumer pull would drive the mind-set changes of the reactive organisation towards sustainability adoption.
The conventional products and services account for costs of “raw materials-manufacturing-distribution-use,” but the invisible costs of emissions, waste, environmental clean-up, end of life disposal are missed in underdeveloped regulatory systems. The actual price paid by the society should therefore be the total of real costs of responsible procurement + manufacture +distribution + use + end of life environmental disposal. The adoption of sustainability practices would therefore increase costs for the conventional products and services in the short term. However,the progressive organisations would phase out
non-sustainable products and develop newer products, processes and services with reduced environmental foot print and circular resource efficiency to bring down the overall cost to customers over time.
CID: What factors are driving the adoption of sustainability by companies? Is it due to governmental pressures from global climate control treaties and societal pressures or is it intrinsically driven? What enabling factors can drive sustainability at an accelerated pace? Regulatory pressures? Governments incentivising the transition? Easier access to cost-competitive cleaner technologies? Access to cheaper funding for R&D and innovation? What else?
KK: While a regulatory push is a huge driver for the adoption of sustainability, it will be effectively driven by the market forces– consumer demand and investor preferences for sustainable products and services. The transition from conventional products/services to sustainable versions can be faster if the cost differential for sustainable products/services can be met through green financing models. Sustainable mobility is a great example. The the enviro-conscious consumers do opt for e-vehicles although the current ownerships costs are higher. The regulators are taxing the conventional vehicles and fuels to compensate the invisible environmental costs and incentivise green energy for e-mobility. Similar models can be adopted by the government in other sectors to fund innovation of circular products, cleaner technologies, and environmental regeneration. This can be further catalysed by increased spend in greener infrastructure for sustainable development of the economy. Another important factor is the sustainability mindset of the young generation, which can be developed though suitable changes in the education systems.
CID: Climate change and consequent global warming and its disastrous impact on the world are real and even frightening. What technological remedies are feasible in the short term and in the longer- term to address this? Shift to renewable fuels and feedstocks? Carbon dioxide capture, storage and utilisation? Or enhance process efficiencies or develop entirely new processes to ensure zero emission – zero waste? Or recycle waste back into the manufacturing process for a circular economy? Can green chemistry help in moving towards zero hazardous chemicals and chemicals with least environmental load?
KK: The climate change and global warming concerns are based on the parameters that are included in the sustainability measurement as stated above. Society should minimise the impact on the ecosystem by resorting to responsible consumerism and sustainable lifestyles. Responsible organisations should switch to renewable material sources, enhance resource efficiency by reducing/reusing waste and improve process efficiency. Energy-intensive processes should reduce emissions by integrating CO2 capture technologies and by adopting renewable energy sources. However, these improvements would yield only marginal benefits for the products designed with the linear economy mindset. Real value generation is possible only by designing new products and services based on the principles of circularity.
Huntsman’ Horizon 2025 strategy is targeting 10percent reduction in energy use and greenhouse gas emission as well as 5 percent reduction in hazardous waste disposal per unit of production by 2025. Huntsman’s offerings such as the theAVITERA® SE range of dyes can reduce water consumption in textile manufacturing by up to 50 percent. Our digital inks reduce water consumption up to 60 percent for the producers of printed textile fabrics. Further, Huntsman uses wastePETequivalent of over one billion bottles annually as raw material to produce polyurethane insulation for saving energy for heating/cooling of buildings. We have technology to reuse PU and rubber waste from footwear industry to make playground flooring. These are some of the examples of howa circular economy focused approach is helping Huntsman innovate new products and processes while also supporting sustainability of the downstream customers.
CID: To what extent can the adoption of Industry 4.0 digital technologies enable sustainability?
KK: Industry 4.0 technologies can effectively minimise resource waste and energy consumption per unit of production. Big data analytics and Internet of Things can help enable optimisation of the production processes and supply chain operations. Artificial intelligence can incorporate circularity principles at the design stage to develop sustainable products and process technologies. Thus, various industry 4.0 technologies can be used to analyse the product life cycles and consumer preferences to deliver better resource efficiencies on a regional/country level to drive sustainable behaviours.
CID: Any other views you have?
KK: Industries and businesses are an integral part of the ecosystem and should work in tandem with other stakeholders. Similarly, society as the end consumer should recognise its role in pushing the governments towards a greener agenda while influencing the organisations to operate responsibly for a sustainable economy. Hence, awareness and education about the circular economy and sustainability mindset are of paramount importance. The industry, media, schools, universities, NGOs, etc. play an equal role in this endeavour. It is perhaps the right time to rethink economic growth parameters, which are also based on linear economy principles. Redefining GDP and business financial parameters based on circular economy and sustainability would allow the government to effectively support sustainable development.
