Scan any news these days and you will find headlines on net-zero and becoming climate-positive. Both concepts are highly relevant to lower CO2 emissions and limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, but what matters most for us at Henkel? Actively contributing to climate protection is at the core of what we do. Dimitri Kozak, who is globally responsible for sustainability in all our Adhesive Technologies operations at Henkel, talks about our ambition to become climate-positive in our operations by 2030 – and how we make this happen at our production sites.
Interview
Net-zero: a heated debate
Short on time? Dive into the key question of your interest:
- What is the difference between net-zero and Henkel's climate-positive ambition?
- Why is Henkel not going for a companywide net-zero ambition right away?
- By 2030 Henkel wants to be climate-positive in operations. How are you tackling this?
- What are our major challenges on the way to becoming climate-positive?
- What will be Henkel´s top priorities for this year?
Net-zero, climate-positive – no matter what news you read, you will for sure come across debates on either one of these approaches. Why they make it into the headlines is clear: Climate change is undeniably one of the major current global challenges. The increasing amount of CO2 has been slowly heating up our planet, affecting weather patterns in all parts of the world, leading to heat waves, a growing number of natural disasters, like hurricanes or flooding, and rising sea levels. Let’s find out how the concepts of net-zero and becoming climate-positive are helping to fight climate change and what we at Henkel do to tackle it.
The path is clear: By 2030, we want to achieve a climate-positive carbon footprint for all our global production sites. Out of the 166 production sites Henkel is operating worldwide, 124 are run by our Adhesive Technologies business. So, the biggest impact on reducing our total CO2 emissions can be realized here.
To turn our entire Henkel operations climate-positive, we continuously strive to increase energy efficiency at all our sites worldwide. By reducing energy consumption, we are also reducing the amount of CO2 that is emitted.
Dimitri Kozak, Head of Global Sustainability & Environmental Performance Adhesive Technologies at Henkel
What is the difference between net-zero and Henkel's climate-positive ambition?
Dimitri Kozak: Both terms are closely related to each other, but the final goal they are referring to is different. Net-zero is targeting emissions across the entire value chain, including our own operations, but going way beyond. It covers the carbon footprint over the entire life cycle of a product, from the raw materials used until it gets disposed of.
Becoming climate-positive focuses on what we can do in our own operations. In a first step this means switching to using 100% renewable energy at our manufacturing sites. If we then generate more energy than we need ourselves and provide the excess to third parties, such as a local industrial park or the municipal grid, we become climate positive. And that’s the ambition we have set ourselves.
NET-ZERO
EMISSIONS
Net-zero CO2 emissions are achieved when CO2 emissions originating from human activity (anthropogenic) are balanced globally by anthropogenic CO2 removals over a specified period of time.
CLIMATE-POSITIVE
OPERATIONS
Being climate neutral with the sale of carbon neutral energy surplus (replacing remaining fossil fuels used in operations with CO2-free alternatives & supply carbon-free energy not needed to third parties)
Why is Henkel not going for a company-wide net-zero ambition right away?
Dimitri Kozak: With net-zero we are very much reliant on everything that happens up- and downstream from our own manufacturing. There is a lot to be factored in that goes beyond the scope of what we can influence in our operations. For a net-zero approach, we’d need to have complete transparency regarding the entire life cycle of our products. This requires seamless collaboration with our suppliers and our customers, sharing data along the entire value chain. Here, we are currently working with our corporate sustainability team and all other sustainability functions in the company on how a credible net-zero ambition across the value chain could look like.
By 2030 Henkel wants to be climate-positive in operations. How are you tackling this?
Dimitri Kozak: A good example is our Adhesive Technologies plant in Norderstedt close to Hamburg, Germany. By upgrading the heating, ventilation and air-cooling system we will reduce its thermal energy demand by 80%.
A second lever is switching our electric and thermal energy supply to renewable sources. This means obtaining 100% of the electricity we use for production from renewable sources and replacing fuels that we need to generate thermal energy with CO2-neutral alternatives such as biogas or biomass. Combining on-site renewable energy and green energy procurement, our Aerospace plant in Montornès del Vallés, Spain reached carbon-neutrality, joining another 13 carbon-neutral production sites as of January 2024, and there will be more to follow next months and years. Supplying the surplus energy that we don’t need for our own purposes to third parties will then turn our operations climate-positive.
What are our major challenges on the way to becoming climate-positive?
Dimitri Kozak: I see three things that we need to address: First, Henkel is a company with global operations, but not all technologies we need to switch to renewables are equally available at every location or in every region – especially when we're looking at biogas or biomass. We want to achieve this goal in a credible way, making a real-world impact, and not only through virtual purchases.
Second, our manufacturing processes influence how we can drive decarbonization of our operations. Let me give you an example: We're currently looking into carbon neutral sand drying for our construction adhesives business. After reviewing the technologies that are available, we found there is no applicable electrification potential, so we are now going for reducing our gas demand with more efficient existing solutions.
Third thing is the lack of equipment and the technology we need to decarbonize our operations. Prices are high, and availability is sometimes very low. If we look at heat pumps for example, the demand has skyrocketed. If we want to install a heat pump at one of our sites, we’re currently looking for supply lead times of 10 to 14 months. Therefore, while planning these projects we are in parallel focusing on local efficiency measures and solar on-site energy generation.
What will be Henkel's top priorities for this year?
Dimitri Kozak: With the ambition of becoming climate-positive in operations by 2030 Henkel is leading in the industry, and the time to take action is now. Our answer to climate change can only be that we act as a forerunner and lead by example. For our Adhesive Technologies business there’s a clear commitment on the table: Becoming the first global adhesive player with climate-positive operations by 2030 – and we are well underway to make it happen.
This year we are focusing on closing the technology assessment for decarbonization of our manufacturing processes and we will finalize our mid-term plan for the next three years, clarifying which sites will be decarbonized next. Once these projects are running, we will focus on the use of renewables in countries and regions where renewable fuels and renewable electricity are not yet fully available on the market and work on supply security.
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