We take care of our products during their whole lifetime. Smart solutions, sustainable innovation and efficient indicators are our driving force. We therefore always incorporate our partners along the value chain.
Based on our materiality assessment, we developed three different streams in which we categorized ➜ our material topics. In the stream Products with Impact, it’s all about scaling up our ➜ sustainable product portfolio and striving for breakthrough innovations.
“Making our coatings more sustainable requires long-term research, altering the chemistry of our products, without compromising on quality and the warrantees that we offer on coil coatings.”
We want to develop products that both meet our customers’ needs and fulfill our shared vision of sustainability. If we succeed, our products are sustainable both in a ➜ functional as well as ➜ material dimension.
We work hard to fulfill this goal, but we still need to improve in a number of areas: choice of raw materials, our suppliers’ environmental and social impact, product performance for applicators and end users, and sustainable solutions for scrapped painted materials. By collaborating with partners along the value chain, we use innovative science in performance coatings to enable positive impact at every touchpoint. By 2030, 100 percent of new R&D products should be net-sustainable. See ➜ our 2030 sustainability strategy
Chemicals that are used in the coating industry can be hazardous or even toxic and accordingly bear the risk of short- and long-term health effects. We are aware of these impacts and constantly work towards mitigating them. Regarding our raw materials, we are working with key partners upstream to build strong and effective collaboration. Following our net sustainable R&D strategy, our upstream collaboration focuses on getting access to more sustainable raw materials. We promote the use of renewable raw materials, avoid using any minerals that are scarce or toxic and develop coatings that provide proven functional sustainability benefits for customers and society while in use.
➜ Circular economy approaches are a major focus of our longer-term R&D and innovation activities. For example, we are looking at using bio-sourced raw materials and recycled plastic content in Beckers' product formulations. We have several active projects under evaluation in these areas with external collaboration partners and technology providers. Moreover, we constantly work on new types of paint formulations to take a more “end-to-end” approach, looking across the full value chain in seeking more sustainable solutions.
We are also working on a number of routes to decarbonize by reducing the use of petroleum-based components and replacing these with renewable, lower carbon alternatives such as water-based, bio-based or recycled materials.
Our ➜ Beckers Sustainability Index (BSI) is a revolutionary tool for transparent product classification. With it we measure the sustainability of our entire product portfolio as well as track and evaluate the effectiveness of our actions. The BSI classifies a coating according to its sustainable impact, taking both ➜ material and functional dimensions into account. The tool provides a holistic perspective and is used by Beckers to guide R&D to develop more sustainable products, and easily demonstrate to customers what a sustainable coating is and how the products they buy from us are categorized. In 2022, the BSI progressed tremendously, as all Beckers entities mapped and visualized their entire product portfolios within the four BSI classes, generating a large amount of global data. The BSI will furthermore be used to categorize our developments in R&D and therefore rated according to their sustainability.
To authenticate our unique scientific approach and prove that the tool is objective, robust, aligned with industry standards, and reliable in all aspects that matter, we asked Ernst & Young to verify the BSI. The assessment is currently still ongoing and will be finalized in 2023.
For more information and details about the BSI, click here.
The development and deployment of our own in-house ➜ Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) enables us to determine the carbon footprint of our products and reflect how we can incorporate more sustainable materials and and improve our own manufacturing processes. We upgraded the LCA capabilities in 2022 and today we are increasingly working with customers’ R&D teams to drive product innovation, identifying routes where together we can reduce the carbon footprint of coil coated steel. Additionally, the total costs for a coating solution become visible when taking the holistic approach of LCA.
In 2022, the Beckers Board decided to invest in a new Sustainable Innovation Centre for long-term development, which serves the efforts of our R&D Team in Liverpool to advance our innovations. The new facility is being constructed in 2023 and will be used primarily for the further development of long-term capability-building in UV/EB radiation curing. This technology has the potential to significantly reduce our carbon footprint and is key for broadening our sustainable coil coating portfolio.
We provided training for all our R&D employees on the BSI and net-sustainable products, and ensured they are thoroughly informed about Beckers’ goals. Our Breakthrough Innovation Roadmap includes all global R&D projects, resources, technical capabilities, information management, collaborations and equipment.
We believe that most challenges are better solved together. We are in continu exchange with our customers and suppliers to analyze and assess the effectiveness of new, more sustainable products and product features. In 2022, we started a project for “renewable carbon” at Beckers. With key suppliers we work to monitor the current CO2 footprint of our raw materials and to reduce this footprint by introducing carbon sources other than fossil. Be it recycled waste, bio-based or from carbon capture technologies, Beckers is actively working with upstream partners in the raw materials supply chain to explore and develop new technologies and approaches. Technologies currently under development in the upstream supply chain, offer tremendous potential for Beckers to reduce our product carbon footprint.
Our strongest commitment is in ➜ our 2030 Sustainability Strategy and goals that we have long communicated.
Different policies and frameworks underline our commitments, such as our Sustainability Policy, ➜ our Group Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) Policy and essential frameworks such as
➜ our Code of Conduct and ➜ our Supplier Code of Conduct.
With our breakthrough innovations, we contribute to the achievement of the ➜ Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) decent work and economic growth (SDG 8), sustainable cities and communities (SDG 11), responsible consumption and production (SDG 12) as well as climate action (SDG 13).
For further information on the SDGs click here.
