Product Assessment Based on Sustainability Criteria
Global accords, such as the Paris Agreement and United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, increasingly demand improved sustainability performance at a product level. We assess and optimize our product portfolio according to sustainability criteria. We address political demands, taking into account the European Union’s European Green Deal.
CES – Silicones Europe has published a video about the industry’s contribution.
WACKER Sustainable Solutions
WACKER Sustainable Solutions (WSS) is our program based on the industrial standard of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) for assessing the sustainability performance of our product portfolios. Intertek, an international inspection and certification company, was appointed as an external body to verify the program. It started its inspection in 2020, which reached a successful conclusion in April 2021.
Product Assessment Using PARC
We consider the entire life cycle of a product or product group in an application, taking into account regional concerns. We designate the combination of product, application and region as PARC. We conduct questionnaires to examine basic criteria such as toxicological classification, regulatory and social criteria, sin industries and raw materials. We use the results to assess our sustainability performance. To explain our assessment system with PARC, we have published a video.
Product Assessment Using PARC
Our goal is that, by 2030, 90 percent of our products should make a neutral or positive contribution to sustainability in accordance with the criteria of the WACKER Sustainable Solutions program. In 2020, we
- Performed 270 PARC assessments and, based on sales,
- Assessed 90 percent of our products using PARC,
- Ascertained a neutral or positive contribution to sustainability in 80 percent of our products,
- Defined measures for improvements in 20 percent of our products.
For product assessment, we use other tools, such as the WACKER ECOWHEEL® and the life cycle assessment.
WACKER ECOWHEEL®
We use the WACKER ECOWHEEL® to represent positive and negative aspects of a product or product group in the value-creation chain, concentrating on key topics in the product’s life cycle: energy, material, water and ecotoxicity. We also provide this tool as an app, which our sales managers, together with our customers, can use to gather sustainability information about a product or an industry, and demonstrate possible optimization potential.
WACKER ECOWHEEL®
Life Cycle Assessments
We assess the environmental effects of key products by means of life cycle assessments. WACKER has been generating life cycle assessments (LCAs) for important intermediates and downstream products since 2010. In our “cradle to gate” assessments, we consider the journey from raw materials production to WACKER’s factory gate.
Product Life Cycle
