WACKER launches sustainability award and honors project team for optimized siloxane production process

Munich, Oct 28, 2022

The Munich-based chemical group WACKER has established a sustainability prize that will be awarded annually to projects implementing the Group’s sustainability goals. For example, WACKER aims to reduce its absolute greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent by 2030 and become climate-neutral by 2045. The €10,000 WACKER Net Zero Award was presented yesterday at this year’s Group Sustainability Conference in Munich. The first prize winner is a project team from Burghausen and Nünchritz that has significantly improved the process for producing siloxane - the most important starting product for silicones.

Plant for producing methylchlorosilanes at the Nünchritz site. Silanes and siloxanes are important precursors for manufacturing silicones. Yesterday WACKER presented its new sustainability prize to a project team that developed an improved process with which a high percentage of organosilicon byproducts from hydrolysis of chlorosilanes is returned into the integrated production system in a targeted manner. (Photo: Wacker Chemie AG)

“Almost a year ago, WACKER set itself very ambitious sustainability goals, which include reducing greenhouse gas emissions from our own products and processes and further minimizing resource consumption,” explained Christian Hartel, president & CEO of Wacker Chemie AG. “Since then, many small- and large-scale projects have been initiated within the Group. To honor and promote this commitment, the company decided to confer the WACKER Net Zero Award this year and in the years to come. This is our way of recognizing outstanding projects that reduce our company's environmental footprint."

This year’s prize goes to a project team comprising Martin Steuer from the methyl chloride synthesis/hydrolysis plant at the Nünchritz site, Sebastian Kröner from Process Development at Central Engineering in Burghausen, and Konrad Mautner from WACKER SILICONES Technology Management. The winners developed a process with which a high percentage of organosilicon byproducts from hydrolysis of chlorosilanes is returned into the integrated production system in a targeted manner. The hydrolysis of chlorosilane is part of the upstream process, which starts out from metallurgical silicon to produce the intermediates chlorosilane and siloxane and ultimately to obtain the downstream product silicone.

“Chlorosilane hydrolysis is a key process step in siloxane production and is thus one of our Group’s core processes,” explained the WACKER CEO in his speech. “Thanks to the award winners’ truly trailblazing approach, we can significantly improve the efficiency of our integrated production system. This reduces byproducts and avoids disposal costs – good for the environment and the profitability of our production.”

The award-winning process is already in use on an industrial scale at the Nünchritz site and is to be implemented at the Burghausen site in the coming years.