Environment
STATUS OF GOALS FOR 2009/2010
Calculate indirect emissions from the purchase of energy (Scope 2 emissions as per Greenhouse Gas Protocol)
Corporate entity: Groupwide
Deadline: 2011
Implementation status: Goal achieved
NEW GOALS
Lower our average specific energy consumption (amount of energy per net production volume) by a further 11 percent from 2013 on. Overall, from 2007 to 2022, we will have brought our specific energy down by one-third.
Corporate entity: WACKER Germany
Deadline: 2022
FUTURE TOPICS
Energy
WACKER will continue to improve its energy efficiency. Due to the acquisition of the silicon-metal plant in Holla (Norway), primary-energy consumption and thus carbon dioxide emissions and electricity consumption are expected to continue to rise. Our electricity consumption will also increase once polysilicon production starts up at our US site in Tennessee, scheduled for 2015.
Emissions Trading
The necessary emissions certificates have been allotted to us free of charge for the 2008 – 2012 trading period. We assume that we will have to contend with additional, medium-term charges due to the purchase of emissions certificates. We limit the costs for the emissions required by constantly working to improve our facilities’ energy efficiency. The only effects associated with a surplus of emissions certificates that WACKER has experienced to date relate to electricity price rises. Since 2013, in accordance with EU and national decisions, we need to include individual production facilities in the trading system, as well as the power plants that are already subject to emissions trading.
Biodiversity
In 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development passed the Convention on Biological Diversity. In May 2011, the EU Commission published a biodiversity strategy to 2020. The German Chemical Industry Association (VCI) is preparing a related policy document, to which WACKER, as a VCI member, is contributing.