GHG & Climate Change

The company has taken various measures to continue reducing its GHG emissions. The main steps already taken and/or planned for the upcoming years include: 

• Eliminating or reducing process GHG emissions: ICL’s replacement of SF₆, previously used as a protective gas during magnesium production, with HFC134a, caused a major reduction at ICL Dead Sea Magnesium. The company has also implemented an innovative system which has reduced N₂O emissions at ICL Haifa (F&C) by 60% per ton nitric acid produced. Both projects were approved by the U.N. CDM mechanism.
• Converting our production plants in Israel to the use of natural gas: Natural gas (NG) offers many environmental benefits, including lower emission of greenhouse gases per unit of energy produced.

• Increasing energy efficiency: ICL is phasing out inefficient production technologies, streamlining our production facilities, increasing the efficiency of our consumption of heat and steam, using residual heat and reducing our consumption of lighting and air conditioning.

• Renewable Energy Usage: As part of ICL’s sustainability vision for 2030, the company has set the goal of annually increasing its total renewable consumption by 20% (year-on-year) from 2019 and onwards, increasingly replacing fossil-fuel based energy. ICL has therefore transitioned most of its sites in Europe to 100% renewable electricity in 2018-19. Furthermore, in the upcoming years, the company plans to install photovoltaic (solar energy) electricity production capacity in available and appropriate areas within the operational boundaries of its sites in Israel, Spain, Germany and additional countries. 

• The future elimination of Oil Shale combustion: For several decades, ICL Rotem (Israel) has been operating PMA, a CHP (combined heat and power) installation, which is fueled by Oil Shales, extracted as part of Rotem’s open-pit Phosphate mining activity. The usage of Oil Shales was originally encouraged by the Israeli government, as a then alternative fuel source to oil. However, since that time- large  NG reserves were found in Israel’s maritime territory, and Oil Shales is now considered an unfavorable fuel source, due to the relatively high amounts of air and GHG emissions it creates upon combustion. ICL Rotem has recently completed a plan to shut down the PMA Oil Shale installation by the end of 2021. The needed electricity and steam will be produced from newer NG based installations, creating a significant reduction in GHGs and other emissions.     

Note: In the chart below, 2008 appears as the base year used by ICL to measure our long-term performance (in addition to short-term, year by year performance).

Following are the yearly trends in total GHG emissions by scope (all converted into CO₂e terms). ICL’s comprehensive GHG inventory analysis is based on the GHG Protocol methodology. The measured emissions include the following GHG’s: CO₂ , CH4, N₂O and HFCs/HCFCs. In 2008 emissions specifically, SF₆ is also included, but its usage has since been stopped by ICL (see above), and from 2010 and onwards- there are zero emissions of SF₆ in all ICL global operations. In all years, ICL has zero consumption/emission of PFCs and NF₃.