ICCA – The Chemical Industry’s Contribution to a 2-Degree World

Challenge

By creating innovative, climate- and energy-friendly solutions for its own processes and for many other industries, the chemical industry aims to play a leading role in the transformation of the global economy. As the leading trade association of the global chemical industry, the ICCA and in particular its Energy and Climate Change Leadership Group is committed to promoting this agenda. To demonstrate the chemical industry's current and future contribution to a climate-neutral society, the ICCA's goal was to produce a compelling, concise and easy-to-understand publication that clarifies this contribution.

Solution

For the preparation of this report, fors.earth and KPMG researched relevant technological solutions, innovations, business models and products. In addition to taking on the role of project manager, fors.earth developed, organised and led four workshops with external stakeholders in Germany, Japan, Brazil and the USA. The focus here was on integrating the perspectives and ways of thinking of various interest groups into the evaluation process for the solutions proposed in the report. Another important contribution was the participation in the preparation of the report, whose target groups are political decision-makers and the interested public.

Impact

As a result of the project, an initial overall list of 1,000 solutions was drawn up, of which 450 generic technologies in which chemicals play a key role were identified as greenhouse gas savings opportunities. 137 of these technologies also had a high feasibility rating. The publication presents 17 individual solutions from the five sectors of energy generation and storage, mobility and transport, food and agriculture, construction and housing, and industry and production, and identifies challenges arising from the low-carbon transformation of the individual sectors. In addition, the CO2 reduction potential of the solutions as well as their impact on the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are shown. The direct impact of the solutions on CO2 reduction by 2050 was estimated based on information provided by the participating companies and the public.