Limited Assurance Report of the Independent Auditor regarding the combined separate non-financial report

To the Supervisory Board of Wacker Chemie AG, Munich

We have performed a limited assurance engagement on the combined separate non-financial report (further “combined separate non-financial report”) of Wacker Chemie AG, Munich (further “Company” or “Wacker Chemie AG”), and the Group for the period from January 1 to December 31, 2022.

Not subject to our assurance engagement are the external sources of documentation, expert opinions, or information, that is not highlighted with a vertical line, mentioned in the combined separate non-financial report. Only the sections highlighted with a vertical line represent the assured content of the combined separate non-financial report.

Responsibilities of Management

Management of the parent company is responsible for the preparation of the combined separate non-financial report in accordance with Sections 315c in conjunction with 289c to 289e HGB (“Handelsgesetzbuch”: German Commercial Code) and Article 8 of REGULATION (EU) 2020/852 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 18. June 2020 on establishing a framework to facilitate sustainable investment and amending Regulation (EU) 2019/2088 (hereinafter the “EU Taxonomy Regulation”) and the Delegated Acts adopted thereunder, as well as for making their own interpretation of the wording and terms contained in the EU Taxonomy Regulation and the delegated acts adopted thereunder as set out in section “EU Taxonomy Regulation” of the combined separate non-financial report.

This responsibility includes the selection and application of appropriate non-financial reporting methods and making assumptions and estimates about individual non-financial disclosures of the group that are reasonable in the circumstances. Furthermore, management is responsible for such internal control as they consider necessary to enable the preparation of a combined separate non-financial report that is free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error.

The EU Taxonomy Regulation and the Delegated Acts issued thereunder contain wording and terms that are still subject to considerable interpretation uncertainties and for which clarifications have not yet been published in every case. Therefore, management has disclosed their interpretation of the EU Taxonomy Regulation and the Delegated Acts adopted thereunder in section “EU Taxonomy Regulation” of the combined separate non-financial report. They are responsible for the defensibility of this interpretation. Due to the immanent risk that indeterminate legal terms may be interpreted differently, the legal conformity of the interpretation is subject to uncertainties.

Independence and Quality Assurance of the Assurance Practitioner’s firm

We have complied with the independence and quality assurance requirements set out in the national legal provisions and professional pronouncements, in particular the Professional Code for German Public Auditors and Chartered Accountants (in Germany) and the quality assurance standard of the German Institute of Public Auditors (Institut der Wirtschaftsprüfer, IDW) regarding quality assurance requirements in audit practice (IDW QS 1).

Responsibility of the Assurance Practitioner

Our responsibility is to express a conclusion with limited assurance on the combined separate non-financial report based on our assurance engagement.

We conducted our assurance engagement in accordance with International Standard on Assurance Engagements (ISAE) 3000 (Revised): “Assurance Engagements other than Audits or Reviews of Historical Financial Information” issued by the IAASB. This standard requires that we plan and perform the assurance engagement to obtain limited assurance about whether any matters have come to our attention that cause us to believe that the company’s combined separate non-financial report, other than the external sources of documentation, expert opinions, or information that is not highlighted with a vertical line, mentioned in the combined separate non-financial report, are not prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with Sections 315c in conjunction with 289c to 289e HGB and the EU Taxonomy Regulation and the Delegated Acts issued thereunder as well as the interpretation by management disclosed in section “EU Taxonomy Regulation” of the combined separate non-financial report.

In a limited assurance engagement, the procedures performed are less extensive than in a reasonable assurance engagement, and accordingly, a substantially lower level of assurance is obtained. The selection of the assurance procedures is subject to the professional judgment of the assurance practitioner.

In the course of our assurance engagement we have, among other things, performed the following assurance procedures and other activities:

• Inquiries of Group level personnel who are responsible for the materiality analysis in order to understand the processes for determining material topics and respective reporting boundaries for Wacker Chemie AG.
• A risk analysis, including media research, to identify relevant information on Wacker Chemie AG’s sus­tainability performance in the reporting period.
• Reviewing the suitability of internally developed Reporting Criteria.
• Evaluation of the design and the implementation of systems and processes for the collection, processing and monitoring of disclosures, including data consolidation, on environmental, employee and social matters, respect for human rights, and anti-corruption and bribery matters.
• Inquiries of management and relevant employees involved in the preparation of the combined separate non-financial report about the preparation process, about the internal control system related to this process, and about disclosures in the combined separate non-financial report.
• Inspection of selected internal and external documents.
• Analytical procedures for the evaluation of data and of the trends of quantitative disclosures as reported at Group level by all sites.
• Evaluation of local data collection, validation and reporting processes as well as the reliability of reported data based on a sample taken at the site in Burghausen in Germany.
• Assessment of the overall presentation of the disclosures.
• Inquiries of Group level personnel in order to understand the processes for identifying relevant economic activities according to the EU Taxonomy Regulation.
• Understanding the design and implementation of systems and processes for the identification, processing and monitoring of turnover, capital expenditure and operating expense disclosures for taxonomy-eligible and taxonomy-aligned economic activities.
• Evaluation of the process for the identification of taxonomy-eligible and taxonomy-aligned economic activities and the corresponding disclosures in the combined separate non-financial report

In determining the disclosures in accordance with Article 8 of the EU Taxonomy Regulation, management is required to interpret undefined legal terms. Due to the immanent risk that undefined legal terms may be interpreted differently, the legal conformity of their interpretation and, accordingly, our assurance engagement thereon are subject to uncertainties.

Assurance Opinion

Based on the assurance procedures performed and the evidence obtained, nothing has come to our attention that causes us to believe that the combined separate non-financial report of Wacker Chemie AG for the period from January 1 to December 31, 2022 has not been prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with Sections 315c in conjunction with 289c to 289e HGB and the EU Taxonomy Regulation and the Delegated Acts issued thereunder as well as the interpretation by management as disclosed in section “EU Taxonomy Regulation” of the combined separate non-financial report.

We do not express an assurance opinion on the external sources of documentation, expert opinions, or information that is not highlighted with a vertical line mentioned in the combined separate non-financial report.

Restriction of Use

This assurance report is solely addressed to the Supervisory Board of Wacker Chemie AG, Munich.

Our assignment for the Supervisory Board of Wacker Chemie AG, Munich, and professional liability is governed by the General Engagement Terms for Wirtschaftsprüfer (German Public Auditors) and Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften (German Public Audit Firms) (Allgemeine Auftragsbedingungen für Wirtschaftsprüfer und Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften) in the version dated January 1, 2017 (https://www.kpmg.de/bescheinigungen/lib/aab_english.pdf). By reading and using the information contained in this assurance report, each recipient confirms having taken note of provisions of the General Engagement Terms (including the limitation of our liability for negligence to EUR 4 million as stipulated in No. 9) and accepts the validity of the attached General Engagement Terms with respect to us.

Munich, March 2, 2023

KPMG AG
Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft

[Original German version signed by:]