DuPont’s Commitment to Energy Efficiency

It’s Energy Awareness Month and DuPont News will publish a collection of articles through the end of October to recognize our company’s commitment to protecting the world and its resources. This first article looks at the DuPont drive for sustainable practices and the evolution of sustainability as a core strategy.

DuPont was founded with safety and health as a core value of its operations and that core value continues today with efforts to reduce energy use in our operations and throughout our customer value chain.

DuPont is known as one of the first companies to focus on the environment and in the evolution of sustainability as a core strategy. DuPont’s first safety rules were handwritten in 1811. The first DuPont statement of environmental responsibility was created in 1938.

In the 1970s and 1980s the company’s focus was on internal safety and meeting environmental regulations. In the late 1980s and 1990s DuPont added voluntary footprint reductions, going beyond regulatory requirements.

Our Current Commitments

In late 1999, DuPont established energy goals for 2010, including:

* Holding total energy flat with 1990 levels.
Progress: Energy use is down 7% overall while business grew by 40% – translating to more than $3 billion in avoided energy costs.
* Obtaining 10% of energy from renewable sources at a cost that is competitive with the best available fossil fuels.
Progress: About 6% of our energy is from renewable sources.

DuPont achieved a 72% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) based on 1990 base levels. In 2006, DuPont established additional footprint goals for 2015, including:

* An additional 15% reduction in DuPont GHG from 2004 baseline.
Progress: GHG emissions down 9.5%, representing 62% of the goal.

In addition, we have implemented a 3-year “Bold Energy Plan” to accelerate our improvement in energy efficiency. This plan requires the 100 largest DuPont sites to establish an annual energy reduction target based on the elimination of defects in energy-using systems.

Collectively, DuPont sites are working on more than 500 defect-elimination projects that will reduce energy use 8% compared to 2007 operations.