2019 European Responsible Care Awards dominated by projects promoting digitalisation and circularity in chemical industry

The European Chemical Industry Council today revealed the winners of the Responsible Care awards showcasing initiatives which lead the way on safe chemicals management.

Marco Mensink, Cefic Director General: “This year’s awards demonstrate how companies are already implementing innovative solutions that we talk about in our Mid-Century Vision. Digitalising our processes and value chain collaboration improves transparency and chemical safety, as demonstrated by several projects. Transforming waste into new raw material reflects our ambition as industry to be the recycler of the circular society.”

The 2019 winners are:
• essenscia, the Belgian association for chemistry and life sciences industries won the National Associations Award for ‘Rethinking Chemical Logistics’. essenscia worked together with other associations from the chemical transport and cleaning sector to digitalise the paper documents indicating if the chemical tanks have been properly cleaned. A digital file is now exchanged along the value chain and everyone has access to this information in real time and full transparency.

• Finnish Kemira Oyj won the Environmental Responsibility Award for its ‘Ferrous Sulphate Waste to Product’ initiative. After their supply of ferrous sulphate was interrupted few years ago, Kemira developed an innovative way of extracting it from an onsite landfill to continue treating wastewater.

• Solvay SA received the Chemical Safety Award for its ‘Product Stewardship Management System’, a digital tool that helps all Solvay business units worldwide manage product safety and ensure compliance with regulatory requirements. Its unique feature is that all product safety-related requirements are combined in one comprehensive tool available in all regions.

• Finnish Neste Oyj took the Sustainable Workplace Award for its learning programme ‘Way Forward to Safety’, which helped instill a culture of safety throughout the organisation. As part of this programme, Neste rolled out hundreds of workshops, e-learning and awareness raising activities, and have also developed crucial safety management processes.

The jury gave a special mention to two runner ups:
• The national association Russian Chemists Union for their dedication to enhancing Responsible Care across Russia;
• Kiilto Oy under the Environmental Responsibility category for developing an intelligent heating system based on circularity.