Green & Bayer

Construction is underway to transform a polluted manmade lake into protected wetlands at the Western Academy of Beijing.

The Western Academy of Beijing (WAB), an international school in the capital, consists of trendy buildings and well-arranged plants.

The school will soon see another upgrade to its environment. Construction is now underway to transform a polluted manmade lake on the school grounds into protected wetlands, which will be then used as an urban environmental education center for the community.

Behind this project is the German chemical and pharmaceutical company Bayer. As the company's latest environmental protection project in China, Bayer will sponsor 3 million yuan over 6 years to the program.

The company will work with WAB and the Jane Goodall Institute China on the project. After the transformation to wetlands, construction will begin for an outdoor environmental education center around the wetlands.

Upon completion, the site will serve as an environmental education base that will offer opportunities for youth to experience the impact of environmental changes to the ecosystem, to be closer to nature and to increase their knowledge about environmental protection, including topics such as understanding the benefits of large-scale recycling and reusing, the preservation of water resources and the protection of the natural wetland ecological environment, Michael Koenig, president of Bayer Greater China, tells China Business Weekly.

"This is a very significant project in our activities towards acting as a good corporate citizen," Koenig says. "The project has a good combination of environmental protection and youth education, which I believe are two fundamental aspects both for a company and also for a society.

"Water is one of our most precious natural resources. Bayer is very supportive of sustainable water initiatives," he says.

Bayer wants the project to be a model for other waterway challenges across China. "We believe that by gathering the resources of environmental experts and partners from the government, NGOs, as well as schools, this project will become an innovative environmental education program," Koenig says.

The project is also a part of Bayer's support of a Green Olympics. The company has provided environment-friendly materials and coatings for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games venues known as the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube.

As one of the world's leading chemicals producers, environmental protection is a focus of Bayer's corporate social responsibility. In November 2007, the company launched its global Bayer Climate Program, with which it will further reduce its CO2 emissions from its production facilities and develop new solutions for increasing climate protection and dealing with climate change.

Bayer will invest 1 billion euros in climate-related research and development and other projects in the next three years. Work has already started on some of the program's projects.

These include a global concept for zero-emission buildings for offices and other industrial buildings, known as "eco-commercial buildings"; the development of stress-tolerant plants and systems to encourage the effective use of crops for biofuels; and the Bayer Climate Check for optimizing production processes.

Between 1990 and 2006, the company cut its absolute global greenhouse gas emissions by 36 percent. In addition, specific emissions per product unit were also lowered as a result of consistent improvements in energy efficiency.

Youth education and environmental protection

Bayer is the world's first private company to collaborate with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to launch environmental protection projects for youth. Bayer and UNEP run together a dozen environmental projects for youth and children worldwide. One of these projects is the annual children's painting competition. It has been held since 1991 and has received over 190,000 entries from children in over 100 countries. This year's competition will focus on Climate Change.

China is also an active participant in the Bayer Young Environmental Envoy program and the Bayer Environmental Award for Media. Every Year, the company rolls out the BYEE program with UNEP among universities to call for their actions for environmental protection. Projects and the selected students will have the chance to go to Bayer headquarters to learn from Bayer and European industry how environmental protection measures have been taken in place. Now it is the 5th year for the program roll out in China. This project again recognizes Bayer for its global commitment to the environment and its dynamic youth educational and outreach efforts in the local market.

China plant

In September 2006, Bayer inaugurated new production facilities at the Bayer MaterialScience subgroup in Shanghai. The site at the Shanghai Chemical Industry Park represents a total investment of 1.8 billion euros through 2012 and is Bayer's biggest-ever investment project outside Germany.

The Bayer Integrated Site in Shanghai includes production facilities for polycarbonate, polyurethane and coating raw materials. For the first time all the major business units of Bayer MaterialScience will have local production facilities with world-scale capacities.

Bayer is developing this project into the company's biggest and most technically advanced production site in the entire Asia-Pacific region. Several measures have been taken to increase energy efficiency and cut emissions, Koenig says.

Bayer products, he says, are making a direct contribution to saving energy and conserving resources in everyday life. For example, polyurethane insulating materials in buildings and refrigerators helps save an enormous amount of energy.

(China Daily 03/24/2008 page8)