Climate Change

Our Paths to Carbon Neutrality

Avient continuously strives for global climate protection. Doing so adds value to both the world and our company. It minimizes the risk of harming human health and the environment, while also reducing potential liabilities and negative impacts on our business.

We acknowledge the implications of climate change. Leadership utilizes findings from the company’s Enterprise Risk Management system to continuously identify and monitor the company’s management of the physical risks associated with climate change including extreme weather events, supply chain disruptions, and technology changes, as well as transitional climate risks associated with legal, regulatory, policy, low carbon energy transition and liability issues. In an effort to enhance our Enterprise Risk Management system, Avient completed a formal Climate Change Scenario Analysis as recommended by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). Findings from this analysis will continue to inform strategic plans, including impacts of investments and acquisitions.

Beyond our stated 2030 GHG and renewable electricity goals, we are dedicated to our operations being carbon neutral by 2050. We know that this will take a lot of work and since 2050 is just around the corner, rapid action and accountability is needed. To drive progress toward carbon neutrality, Avient’s low carbon transition plan targets intermediated (2030) goals around Scope 1 (direct) and Scope 2 (indirect) sources of greenhouse gas emissions. These targets are in line with prevailing climate science limits that keep global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius as detailed by the Paris Agreement and the Science-Based Target Initiative (SBTi). In 2022, Avient is committed to comprehensively understanding our Scope 3 footprint and developing a strategy that begins to address it and further align with science based targets. Furthermore, in 2022, Avient is instituting an internal cost of carbon to better prioritize low-carbon investments.

Avient’s approach to reducing our greenhouse gases and other emissions is focused on four main areas: increasing equipment and building energy efficiency, process transformation, expanding the use of renewable or low-carbon energy, and supporting technology breakthroughs by meeting our customer’s sustainable solution needs. The overall management strategy for our emission reduction program is led by Avient’s Planet Sub-Committee of the Sustainability Council. This committee is comprised of operational and sourcing leaders from our various regions and ensures continual progress towards our Sustainability Goals and operational efficiency goals. Execution of this strategy is achieved by our business segments working closely with our individual facilities, the EH&S team, and the Planet Sub-Committee.

Most of Avient’s GHG emissions are attributable to the consumption of energy. Strategic plans at the facility and Business level include planned efforts to achieve sustainability and operational goals. In 2021, we were able to further optimize the resource and energy consumption of our production through initiating 102 energy saving projects around the world. For detailed information on these projects, our energy and carbon performance, risks and opportunities presented by climate change, and associated governance systems, we invite you to read our most recent Climate Change Report submitted to CDP. Avient leverages CDP’s Climate Change Report as its primary mechanism to publicly disclose progress against TCFD recommendations. Our performance on both energy consumption and GHG emissions is provided in graphics below.