AkzoNobel using 100% renewable electricity in Latin America

All of AkzoNobel’s manufacturing locations in Latin America are now operating on 100% renewable electricity, further boosting the company’s ambition to reduce carbon emissions across the full value chain by 50% by 2030 (baseline 2018).

The milestone – reached late last year – follows on from similar achievements in North America (early 2023) and Europe (early 2022).

“We’re very proud to have successfully switched over to 100% renewable electricity and give further momentum to the company’s drive to transition all of its sites globally,” says Daniel Campos, Director of AkzoNobel’s Decorative Paints Latin America business and a member of the Executive Committee.

The paints and coatings facility in Rionegro, Colombia

The transition to 100% renewable electricity in Latin America has included installing 1,580 panels at the Decorative Paints facility in Recife, Brazil – which supplies more than 30% of its energy needs – and 4,640 panels at the Rionegro paints and coatings plant in Colombia, which provides 24% of the site’s energy. The company currently operates 19 manufacturing sites in the region.

“As the first paints and coatings company to set science-based sustainability targets, we’re fully focused on fulfilling our ambitions and this latest achievement in Latin America is another important step in the right direction,” adds Wijnand Bruinsma, AkzoNobel’s Director of Sustainability.

“We also continue to engage with suppliers and develop sustainable solutions in order to help our customers reduce their own carbon footprint.”

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By the end of 2023, 82 AkzoNobel locations were using 100% renewable electricity and 31 locations had installed solar panels as a supplementary source of energy. Examples of how the company is moving to 100% renewable electricity globally include:

• Self-generated renewable electricity – we’re actively installing solar panels at many of our locations and continue to make steady progress
• Sourcing renewable electricity – the electricity generated by our solar panels covers only part of our total electricity consumption needs. For the remainder, we’ll continue to purchase renewable electricity with certificates of origin

For more details about our sustainability ambitions, visit the Sustainability section of the website.