Here’s Why DuPont Performance Building Solutions and Corian® Design is Betting on Sustainability

At a recent internal meeting I was asked an important question: Are you betting big on sustainability? Short answer – yes!

Our sustainability strategy is this: We will partner with our customers and the industry to deliver innovative construction solutions that drive total carbon of buildings to zero, increase circularity of materials, and utilize safer chemistries, to realize our shared vision of sustainability within the built environment.

Here’s why we’re betting on sustainability:

Sustainability is core to our DuPont Performance Building Solutions and Corian^® Design business strategy

It’s undeniable that huge sustainability transitions need to happen in our market over the next decade. Buildings are responsible for nearly 40 percent of global GHG emissions and roughly one-third of all waste is related to building and construction. Even more, many building products rely on hazardous chemicals that must be properly managed across the lifecycle of the product to achieve market expectations in product performance.

That means we must bet on lower embodied carbon solutions, advancements in the circular economy, and safer by design innovation. As Larry Fink of BlackRock has been articulating for some time, if we don’t get this right as a business, won’t be around in the next decade!

At DuPont Performance Building Solutions and Corian® Design, we are focused on driving projects that advance our sustainability goals and those of our customers. As you can read in our newly published sustainability progress report, we’ve already had some success. Our newly enhanced, innovative Low-GWP Froth-Pak™ Spray Foam reformulation provides a spray foam blowing agent package that delivers a reduction in global warming potential (GWP) of more than 99 percent compared to blowing agents used in past formulations. Our Styrofoam™ blowing agent reformulation delivers product innovation in the Styrofoam™ Brand Insulation product line that achieves a substantial reduction in embodied carbon using low GWP blowing agent solutions. Our BluEdge technology, which has been deployed all over the world and most recently in China, has helped the polystyrene insulation foam industry phase out of HBCD. This is a solid start, but nowhere near enough. We are betting on a number of innovations in our pipeline to keep driving progress on our sustainability goals, which we look forward to sharing in future sustainability reports.

Sustainability is in our DNA

The building and construction industry will play a huge role in helping society achieve the transformations necessary to navigate our most critical sustainability challenges. We see our responsibility in helping lead that transition, and in driving innovative solutions to address those challenges. We are integrating sustainability into our everyday work and activating our sustainability DNA to drive progress against our goals. I am energized by the passion that I see regularly across our organization to bring our sustainability goals to life.

We think that one day all buildings need to emit zero operational and embodied carbon, need to participate in a completely circular economy, and need to be made from green chemistry materials. We have a lot of work to do, but we’re committed to applying our building science to innovate as if our future depends on it. We’re betting that it does!