Product Development

For the management and long-term development of our product portfolio, we follow an approach with three perspectives. This is based on the LANXESS Product Sustainability Monitor. Using this analytical tool, we identify products that are produced in a particularly sustainable manner as well as products where we see potential for improvement, and have been increasing the sustainability performance of our portfolio for years.

The second significant perspective is the product carbon footprint (PCF) and the circular potential of our products. Here, it is important to understand and account for the upstream value chain as well as our own production. The aim is to continuously reduce our products’ influence on the climate, to use sustainable raw materials and to ensure that our products can be recycled.

As a third perspective, we look at the benefit of our products in their application. A sustainable world needs not only sustainably manufactured products but also solutions for new concepts such as in the areas of climate protection or circular economy. For example, additives make a significant contribution to extending the useful life of products or enabling materials to be recycled.

The EU Taxonomy is an additional, independent perspective. At present, for the chemical industry it concentrates chiefly on the identification of activities associated with particularly high carbon emissions, i.e. on high-volume basic chemicals and plastic products. In this respect, only a small portion of the LANXESS portfolio is relevant here.