The 36th Solvents Industry Association Annual General Meeting and Conference took place on Thursday 29th September 2022 at Champney’s Mottram Hall, Cheshire.
With Conference themes of sustainability, health & safety and challenges facing the chemical industry, a packed programme of invited guest speakers addressed a record number of Members and guests from more than 30 companies.
SIA Chair Andrew Ford
SIA Chair Andrew Ford kicked off proceedings with the formal Annual General Meeting, which highlighted the activities of the Association from the past 12 months and detailed plans for our activities and initiatives in the coming year.
Keith Mead, Haltermann Carless
Keith Mead, Sustainability Manager with Haltermann Carless followed with ‘The Path to Sustainability’, highlighting the measures taken by the Harwich based manufacturer to reduce carbon impact and their work in the community.
Adrian Da Costa, Global Business Development Director with ExxonMobil Chemical Limited, then followed with details of how the company is tackling net zero targets with an insightful presentation of Exxon’s ‘Advancing Climate Solutions’ progress report, detailing carbon capture initiatives.
Dr. Christophe Hein, TotalEnergies
The afternoon session saw further ‘Road to Net Zero’ presentations from SIA Producer Members, with Dr. Christophe Hein of TotalEnergies commencing the session with ‘Energy is Reinventing Itself’, informing delegates of TE’s approach to energy transition, with Bio-based feedstocks being a key contributor.
Dr. Juan Jose Corral of Cepsa Chemicals detailed the well-established strides being made by the company in carbon reduction, particularly with the introduction of 100% renewable energy supply at their production plants, with his ‘A Sustainable Future is Now’ address.
Dr. Juan Jose Corral, Cepsa Chemicals
John Sutton, Suttons Group
In a change to the sustainability theme, John Sutton, CEO of Suttons Group gave an interesting insight into global supply chain challenges facing the bulk haulage industry and the steps being made to combat the issues. Steve Elliott, CEO of the Chemical Industries Association followed up with a detailed look at the how the UK Chemical Industry will need to adapt in the face of many current and future market pressures.
Steve Elliott, CIA
Jennifer Deeney
Following the afternoon break, guest speaker Jennifer Deeney gave a unique and deeply personal address on people’s attitudes to Health & Safety, which made a huge impression on many of the attending delegates.
Dr. Rob Oades, Shell Chemicals
Rounding off proceedings was Dr. Rob Oades, who presented Shell Chemicals‘ broad approach to sustainability, particularly in the fields of alternative feedstocks and asset electrification. Dr. Oades is also Chair of the SIA Technical Committee.
SIA Chief Executive Andrew Norman said, ‘We know that our solvent Producer Members are working hard to introduce new technologies and initiatives to reduce carbon impact and to achieve net zero targets, but the speaker programme for this year’s Conference enabled us to collate all of these activities into a sustainability snapshot for delegates, all in one place at the same time’.
‘Today is just the start of our aim to inform people of the great work that is going on in our industry to tackle carbon emissions. Many thanks to all of our speakers, who have each offered a different insight into what can and is being done right now and in the immediate future’, he added.
If you would like to learn more about Membership of the SIA, our Members, the 2022 Conference or future events, please contact Andrew Norman, SIA Chief Executive via the link Contact Us
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