Transition Finance for Sustainable Chemicals and Materials

Innovation in chemicals is needed to respond to the many planetary crises - from climate change to biodiversity. The financial community has a role to play in supporting this innovation so that safer more sustainable chemicals are adopted throughout the value chain. Investors are already pushing for a decrease in hazardous chemicals use, but this is not yet matched by a similar awareness and support for chemical innovation. The financial community can use sustainable chemistry criteria to guide companies efforts towards holistically addressing planetary crises.

This partnership engaged with the financial community through many one on one meetings and two hybrid meetings. As a result of these conversations, IEHN and the Catalyst assessed the current state of the financial community’s support for sustainable chemistry and proposed an approach to grow the support of sustainable chemistry. We explored the current state of tools for investors to assess the chemical risk and opportunity of companies across the supply chain. As a case study, we also delved into the financial communities’ support for sustainable chemistry in the chemical industry. Lastly, our project developed an investment case for sustainable chemistry and proposed a strategic approach to growing sustainable chemistry finance.