Teaming up to decarbonize the value chain

When it comes to sustainability, one thing is clear – we can’t drive meaningful change on our own. That’s why collaboration is so important.

Having set an ambitious goal of halving carbon emissions across our value chain (Scope 3) by 2030, we’re firmly focused on reaching our goal. So we’re working hard to join forces with suppliers and develop solutions together.

One of the latest collaborations involved teaming up with Arkema and Omya to map out a landscape of decorative paint formulations with a reduced carbon footprint of up to 35%¹.

We combined Arkema’s bio-based and bio-attributed binders and additives, and Omya’s recycled and opacity booster minerals, with our formulation expertise. The aim was to incorporate raw materials with up to 40% circular sources into high volume consumer products, without compromising on quality or performance.

Lower carbon footprint

“The work we carried out together demonstrated the potential to develop lower carbon footprint paints while maintaining performance in brightness, opacity, yellowing resistance and wet scrub resistance,” explains David Williams, Chief Innovation Officer at AkzoNobel. “These advances are another step in paving the way to adopting solutions that will help shape the future of lower carbon footprint paints and coatings.”

Adds Julie Haevermans, Chief Marketing Officer, Arkema Coating Solutions: “As the industry is actively working on decarbonizing its value chain, we want to collectively accelerate the development of next generation paints to meet increasing industry and consumer demand, Green Deal regulations and green building certifications. Our efforts have been driven by the common objective to make lower carbon footprint solutions the mainstream.”

Focus on innovation

Innovation was very much at the heart of the partnership and the three companies used modern, high throughput lab automation processes – including advanced AI tools – to help accelerate development.

“Thanks to advanced lab automation and AI-driven experimental design, we achieved commercially relevant paint formulations with considerably reduced carbon footprint within a short time,” says Philipp Mueller, Vice President Construction at Omya. “There are also clear indications that even further reductions are possible going forward.”

The partnership is very much the tip of the supply chain collaboration iceberg as we continue to look for promising opportunities. For example, AkzoNobel and Arkema are working on another project together – along with another value chain partner – which is also focused on collectively reducing carbon emissions.

“By working across the value chain, we’re taking meaningful steps towards carbon footprint reduction,” explains Wijnand Bruinsma, AkzoNobel’s Director of Sustainability. “We can’t drive the reduction of Scope 3 carbon emissions by ourselves, that’s why collaboration is so important. Partnerships play a key role in making change happen quicker, so we’ll continue to proactively work with our stakeholders and identify opportunities to create shared value.”

^{1 Cradle-to-grave including biogenic uptake according to ISO 14040, 14044 and 14067.}