Running on full power

Dutch chemical companies have teamed up to make their production processes more sustainable

Modern chemical companies receive some bad press. With growing climate awareness, their output of environmentally damaging products and high energy use is attracting societal scrutiny.

Dutch chemical companies, which produce a relatively large amount of basic chemicals, are facing a particularly intense backlash. Their emission intensity—the amount of carbon dioxide they emit per euro of revenue—is higher than in other countries including Belgium, Germany and the UK. This is because basic chemical production is an emission-intensive process, but their impact on the environment is coming in for increasing criticism.