Decarbonizing America’s Industrial Sector

Executives from some of the country’s top industrial companies – including chemicals, steel, glass, cement, oil and gas, among other key industries – have gathered at our Decarbonizing America’s Industrial sector conference to identify the most effective and viable strategies to decarbonize their business models in the face of growing concern over climate change and carbon emissions.

As politicians, regulators and consumers increase the pressure for sustainability, they have these critical industries squarely in their sights as hard to abate industries such as cement and steel currently accounts for approximately 30% of all domestic American GHG emissions.

But decarbonizing the industrial sector is difficult because many of processes require high heat or chemical reactions that are impossible to replicate without the use of fossil fuels.

Additionally, long investment horizons and high upfront capital costs mean that the timeframe for abatement is long.

“Most of the time sustainability is more expensive than the alternatives.  This is a challenge between doing what's right and what’s profitable,” observes Olmo Lopez, Director Innovation and Ready-Mix Performance at Holcim. “How do you balance those competing needs so that you can move forward?”

READ: How Civitas Energy Uses Electrification and Offsets to Reduce Emissions

Industrial companies are responding to the challenge with a range of strategies. These include new product development, sourcing more sustainable materials, increasing energy efficiency and electrification, adopting low-carbon fuels and capturing carbon emissions at source.

“You need all the tools in the toolkit. It won’t be one technology or solution that helps us address this challenge,” says Jana Mosley, President of ENMAX Power, a Canadian utility, quoted in a special IX Network report, an Oil and Gas IQ sister publication. “It’s not just solar. It's not just wind. It's not just batteries. It's not just electric vehicles. We need all these things, and we need to look at products that help us be more efficient in how we use electricity.”

READ: The 4 Pathways to Industrial Decarbonization

Industry partnerships and government regulations will be crucial to help the industrial sector respond with more sustainable solutions. Nikola Juhasz, Global Technical Director of Sustainability at Sun Chemical describes how her company has been using a waste stream from a local steel making operation as feedstock for one of their chemical manufacturing processes.

The partnership means that what otherwise would have been a waste product can be re-used and repurposed into a high value item.

“In the traditional model, everybody operated in their space and thought about the immediate upstream suppliers and the immediate downstream customers,” she explains in an interview IX Network. “But we didn’t necessarily reach further backward or forward. […] Industrial decarbonization is not going to happen from one player alone. It will really take collaboration across the entire supply and value chain.”

READ: Industrial Decarbonization Requires an Ecosystem

Decarbonizing America’s Industrial Sector conference started today (Tuesday) with workshops that focus on everything from the role of digitization and data in decarbonization to developing your strategies.

On Wednesday, Maureen Kline, Vice President, Public Affairs and Sustainability, North America, Pirelli and Nicole Voss, Director, Sustainability, Advanced Drainage Systems will be keynoting the conference with a discussion on creating industry alliances and partnerships to drive decarbonization.

Plus, there will be case studies and presentations from senior executives at Chevron, Schnitzer Steel, Ashgrove Cement, Covestro, Tetra Pak and many more throughout the three-day conference.

Interested in learning more about this topic?

If you’re tasked with reducing methane emissions in your operations, join us at the National Summit on Methane Mitigation, taking place at the Norris Conference Centre, Houston on December 6-8, 2022. 

Join over 200 of your industry peers to get up to the minute updates on methane mitigation research and development efforts including monitoring sensors, data management systems, modular conversion technologies and alternative uses for stranded natural gas. Download the agenda now for more information.