sustainability Home > About > Sustainability > Sustainability at Ashland > Chairman's message Chairman's Message always solving It’s much more than Ashland’s new tagline. It represents the promise we make to our customers, shareholders, employees and local communities every day. It also captures the essence of how we approach sustainability and our responsibility toward being a better steward of our people, products and planet. Every day, our employees come to work with a passion for making a lasting, positive difference and are continuously seeking ways to better integrate our sustainability efforts into our daily actions. It’s how we collaborate with customers to deliver breakthrough products while reducing our environmental footprint. And it’s how we give back to the communities where our employees live and work by supporting a broad range of non-profit organizations, including those that promote environmental responsibility. Whether it’s volunteering to plant cherry trees at primary schools near Shanghai, China, educating local children in Benicarló, Spain, on the importance of recycling, or clearing invasive plants at the Audubon Wildlife Reserve in Bernardsville, New Jersey, Ashland teams are committed to helping protect our environment and enhance our local communities. In addition, we continue to dedicate roughly one-third of our annual contributions to education-related activities, with a primary focus on science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) initiatives. Ashland has made formal commitments to improve the environmental, health, safety and security performance for facilities, processes and products throughout our global footprint. We deliver on these commitments through our comprehensive Responsible Care® program, a global industry initiative to advance the safe and secure management of chemical products and operations. Within Ashland, this program includes a global management system, employee involvement at every level of the organization, continuous improvement toward our goal of operating with zero incidents, ensuring 100 percent compliance, and reducing our environmental, health, safety and security impact. As you’ll see in the sustainability section of ashland.com, we are dedicated to continually improving upon our sustainability efforts. Here are just a few highlights of Ashland’s progress during fiscal 2015: The American Chemistry Council (ACC) honored Ashland with its 2016 Responsible Care® Initiative of the Year Award, in recognition of its reinvigoration of the Zero Incident Program. Responsible Care - two new Ashland sites were added to the company’s Global Certificate for RC 14001 in 2015. Ashland achieved an 18% reduction in total environmental incidents, including a 50% reduction in significant incidents. Three Ashland sites received Energy Efficiency Awards by the ACC during 2015. Three-day ergonomics kaizen events held at Ashland facilities resulted in the company receiving a second place award from the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation 2016 Safety Innovator Competition. During the events employees located and fixed more than 200 ergonomics hazards and duplicated many efforts at other Ashland facilities. At Ashland, we are passionate about creating technologies and solutions to improve our customers’ products and processes, reducing our environmental impact, preserving natural resources and enhancing the quality of life within our communities. This year, Ashland developed Year 2020 environmental goals aimed at reducing our use of energy and water as well as reducing our emissions and environmental footprint. Moving forward, our approach to sustainability will be guided by these goals, which target short- and long-term production weighted outcomes in five specific areas of focus: Energy: Reduce energy consumption and improve energy efficiency by 10 percent Greenhouse gas emissions: Reduce GHG emissions by 10 percent Hazardous waste: Reduce hazardous waste generation by 10 percent Nonhazardous waste: Track nonhazardous waste generation to establish a baseline for a future reduction goal Water: Develop a baseline for water use at Ashland sites in water-stressed regions of the world and/or maintain to base-year level. These goals are just the beginning. Going forward, we will find ways to be more sustainable through innovative products, sustainable operations and supply chains, and new areas and ways we have not yet considered. To help us get there, we plan to create a Sustainability Council; we also intend to launch a sustainability engagement team, composed of employees from around the globe that will work closely with the new council. At Ashland, the primary focus of engagement teams is to address a critical topic such as sustainability that can be improved. We envision a team that can represent customers, employees and stakeholder ideas while also helping the council expand the concept of sustainability to key areas such as the value of our products and our brand reputation. I am proud of the more than 5,000 Ashland employees around the world who are dedicated to achieving the highest safety standards and are passionate about giving back to the communities in which they live and work. In the year ahead, we look forward to sharing the progress we’ve made toward the “Ashland Way” of respecting, protecting and advancing the people we work with, companies we serve, shareholders who invest in our future, communities we’re a part of, and planet we share. Thank you for your support. Chairman’s Message always solving It’s much more than Ashland’s new tagline. It represents the promise we make to our customers, shareholders, employees and local communities every day. It also captures the essence of how we approach sustainability and our responsibility toward being a better steward of our people, products and planet. Every day, our employees come to work with a passion for making a lasting, positive difference and are continuously seeking ways to better integrate our sustainability efforts into our daily actions. It’s how we collaborate with customers to deliver breakthrough products while reducing our environmental footprint. And it’s how we give back to the communities where our employees live and work by supporting a broad range of non-profit organizations, including those that promote environmental responsibility. Whether it’s volunteering to plant cherry trees at primary schools near Shanghai, China, educating local children in Benicarló, Spain, on the importance of recycling, or clearing invasive plants at the Audubon Wildlife Reserve in Bernardsville, New Jersey, Ashland teams are committed to helping protect our environment and enhance our local communities. In addition, we continue to dedicate roughly one-third of our annual contributions to education-related activities, with a primary focus on science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) initiatives. Ashland has made formal commitments to improve the environmental, health, safety and security performance for facilities, processes and products throughout our global footprint. We deliver on these commitments through our comprehensive Responsible Care® program, a global industry initiative to advance the safe and secure management of chemical products and operations. Within Ashland, this program includes a global management system, employee involvement at every level of the organization, continuous improvement toward our goal of operating with zero incidents, ensuring 100 percent compliance, and reducing our environmental, health, safety and security impact. As you’ll see in the sustainability section of ashland.com, we are dedicated to continually improving upon our sustainability efforts. Here are just a few highlights of Ashland’s progress during fiscal 2015: The American Chemistry Council (ACC) honored Ashland with its 2016 Responsible Care® Initiative of the Year Award, in recognition of its reinvigoration of the Zero Incident Program. Responsible Care - two new Ashland sites were added to the company’s Global Certificate for RC 14001 in 2015. Ashland achieved an 18% reduction in total environmental incidents, including a 50% reduction in significant incidents. Three Ashland sites received Energy Efficiency Awards by the ACC during 2015. Three-day ergonomics kaizen events held at Ashland facilities resulted in the company receiving a second place award from the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation 2016 Safety Innovator Competition. During the events employees located and fixed more than 200 ergonomics hazards and duplicated many efforts at other Ashland facilities. At Ashland, we are passionate about creating technologies and solutions to improve our customers’ products and processes, reducing our environmental impact, preserving natural resources and enhancing the quality of life within our communities. This year, Ashland developed Year 2020 environmental goals aimed at reducing our use of energy and water as well as reducing our emissions and environmental footprint. Moving forward, our approach to sustainability will be guided by these goals, which target short- and long-term production weighted outcomes in five specific areas of focus: Energy: Reduce energy consumption and improve energy efficiency by 10 percent Greenhouse gas emissions: Reduce GHG emissions by 10 percent Hazardous waste: Reduce hazardous waste generation by 10 percent Nonhazardous waste: Track nonhazardous waste generation to establish a baseline for a future reduction goal Water: Develop a baseline for water use at Ashland sites in water-stressed regions of the world and/or maintain to base-year level. These goals are just the beginning. Going forward, we will find ways to be more sustainable through innovative products, sustainable operations and supply chains, and new areas and ways we have not yet considered. To help us get there, we plan to create a Sustainability Council; we also intend to launch a sustainability engagement team, composed of employees from around the globe that will work closely with the new council. At Ashland, the primary focus of engagement teams is to address a critical topic such as sustainability that can be improved. We envision a team that can represent customers, employees and stakeholder ideas while also helping the council expand the concept of sustainability to key areas such as the value of our products and our brand reputation. I am proud of the more than 5,000 Ashland employees around the world who are dedicated to achieving the highest safety standards and are passionate about giving back to the communities in which they live and work. In the year ahead, we look forward to sharing the progress we’ve made toward the “Ashland Way” of respecting, protecting and advancing the people we work with, companies we serve, shareholders who invest in our future, communities we’re a part of, and planet we share. Thank you for your support. Bill Wulfsohn Ashland Chairman and Chief Executive Officer William A. Wulfsohn Chairman and Chief Executive Officer efficacy usability allure integrity profitability about industries investors products sds search global code of conduct suppliers and vendors terms of use privacy transparency in supply chain disclosure efficacy usability allure integrity profitability ©2017, Ashland. All rights reserved.