no approval for new projects that fail to meet environmental standards and ongoing improvements for existing facilities to increase energy efficiency are the top priorities this year for ren jianxin, president of china national chemical corp (chemchina).
ren is leading chemchina, the country's top chemicals manufacturer to be more eco-friendly. "energy savings and cutting pollution is our most important work this year," he says.
the company's theme for this year's work on energy and environment, is called "zero emissions". and beginning this year all the company's subsidiaries will be creating their own specific plans on for energy conservation and pollution control.
for instance, jinan yuxing chemical co has signed an agreement with the local government on pollution control for the 11th five-year plan period (2006-10). haohua yuhang co in jiaozuo in henan has invested more than 100 million yuan on environmental protection in recent years.
chemchina has also taken part in several environmentally friendly projects in the country. for example, it built the rainwater recycling system for the bird's nest.
the recycled water is used for washing the stadium, roads, and garages, flushing toilets and for air conditioners, as well as irrigating the land around the venue.
"china's chemical industry should pay increasing attention to energy and environmental issues, in order to achieve healthier growth," says ren.
domestic companies should learn from leading global chemical companies about the issues, he says. with advanced technologies in hand, many global chemical companies have done intensive work in the energy and environmental fields.
their manufacturing facilities in china well reflect this. for example, in the wuxi plant of german chemical manufacturer lanxess in eastern jiangsu province, the company has used water saving technology to clean up chemical reaction kettles, and recycling the cleaning water enables the plant to achieve nil dischages of wastewater.
with these applications the total power consumption of the wuxi production base fell 69 percent compared with 2006, waste discharges was reduced by 55 percent, and water consumption was cut by over 80 percent compared with two years ago.
lanxess is now building a new power plant in brazil fueled with bagasse, the fibrous components of sugar cane that are left over from sugar production. through the use of this renewable fuel, energy generation becomes completely co2-neutral, which basically means that no more co2 is released into the atmosphere than is absorbed by the sugar cane plants.
"the deployment of resource-conserving, environmentally friendly production processes is an important part of our global sustainability strategy. with the construction of this new power plant, we are establishing an ideal link between ecological and economic factors," says werner breuers, a member of the board of management of lanxess ag.
green opportunities
under the plan drawn up by the china petroleum and chemical industry association, in the year 2010 the energy consumption per unit of gdp in china's chemical industry will fall 15 to 20 percent compared with 2005. but the sector needs to see more technological improvements to achieve this target.
this need gives big business opportunities to chemical companies. for chemchina, it is making efforts to improve the technologies used for effluent treatment at refineries and to eliminate chlorine and alkali discharges.
chemchina's subsidiary china national bluestar (group) corp earlier said it entirely eliminated toxic residues from chromium chemical production at a pilot plant in henan province.
with the cooperation of the chinese academy of science, the company built the world's first pollution-free plant to make chromium oxide green, desulphurizing products and potassium chromate.
chromium chemicals are used in the lighting industry, leather tanning, pigments and electroplating. bluestar's project has zero discharges of chromium residue and chromium dust, and consumes 20 percent less power than traditional technologies.
the growth of lanxess's green business could double the rate of the overall market growth in china. the company will focus increasingly on green chemistry products, axel heitmann, chairman of the lanxess board, says.
