BUSINESS
Carbide's Kennedy Expresses Views On Industry Safety, Other Issues Palladium medal recipient airs concerns over environmental problems, science education standards, international trade pacts now under negotiation Marc S. Reisch, C&EN Northeast News Bureau
This Wednesday evening in New York City, Robert D. Kennedy, chairman and chief executive officer of Union Carbide, will be presented with the International Palladium Medal. He will receive the award, given by the American Section of the Société de Chimie Industrielle every two years, in recognition of his "many and distinguished contributions to the world chemical industry." Although Kennedy has spent his entire career at Union Carbide, his experience within the corporation has given him broad familiarity with the world's chemical industry. He joined Carbide 36 years ago, shortly after receiving his mechanical engineering degree, and has held a number of positions at the corporation. Initially he started at the Edgewater Research Laboratory of the National Carbon Division. Later, he not only managed Carbide's European carbon business, but served as president of the Linde Industrial Gases Division and president and chief operating officer of Carbide's chemicals and plastics business. Since assuming the position of chairman and chief executive officer in 1986, Kennedy has helped reshape and reinvigorate Carbide in the wake of the Bhopal disaster. He has done more than merely try to put the accident behind the compa14
May 13, 1991 C&EN
ny in a tentative settlement with the Indian government; he has faced the larger issue of corporate environmental responsibility head on. As a past chairman of the Chemical Manufacturers Association, and in his continuing involvement with CMA, he has championed many of the industry's safety programs and community outreach efforts now under way. Kennedy acknowledges that when he became chairman of Carbide the company was in a crisis. Today as he looks back to the events following the 1984 Bhopal disaster, Kennedy is still impressed at the way the chemical industry not only rallied around Carbide and its chairman, but also genuinely wanted to know just what happened and how such an accident might be prevented in the future. It was an accident that many chemical industry captains hoped would never happen. But Kennedy recalls other high-profile industrial chemical accidents that occurred in the past. There were the dioxin accident at Seveso and the Rhine River spill that propelled the domestic and international chemical industry into action, he notes. Kennedy's perspective on the chemical industry's response to the environmental disasters of the 1980s is unique. At the time of the Bhopal accident, he recalls, "I was two levels down from the chairman at the time, Warren Anderson, but I was Union Carbide's representative to CMA." CMA leaders, who also head major U.S. chemical companies, came to visit Anderson both out of concern for how such a disaster could occur and "to support Warren and his reputation and particularly to support him in his visit to India immediately following the gas leak to accept moral responsibility."
As soon as Carbide was able to piece together some of the particulars surrounding Bhopal, Carbide executives told CMA leaders at the group's meeting "all we knew." What Kennedy says he found remarkable at the time was "the outpouring of concern and support from the industry in general. We weren't ostracized or cut off. We never lost a customer as a result of the accident. Our creditors and suppliers stayed with us." It was at that time that Anderson decided, Kennedy says, that "whatever we were in the past, in the future we would be second to none in our codes and management practice" to protect people and the environment. He recalls that Anderson set up a special committee within the corporation to examine the company's environmental and safety practices. Anderson also appointed a corporate vice president of environmental affairs and hired an independent third-party consultant, Arthur D. Little Inc., to do an independent corporate management audit. Carbide's business response to its environmental disaster fostered a parallel decision within the industry that it, too, needed to take action. "CMA decided that the Bhopal incident was the last straw," says Kennedy. "Something had to be done. The public at the time thought we were lower than a snake's belly." The industry organization's first response was to adopt the Responsible Care program, patterned after a Canadian program. The Canadian chemical industry had worked out its Responsible Care protocol two years before CMA's adoption of it "with the Canadians' blessing," Kennedy says. It was not a pro forma adoption of an environmental responsibility program, he adds. CMA officers "spent a lot of
time selling the program to the membership. It is now a condition of membership in CMA." Adoption of the Responsible Care program did not immediately improve the chemical industry's public image, and, of course, the industry did not expect it would. Kennedy explains that the industry thought that with the program and a commitment to reduce emissions, it could develop a track record and show that it was doing the right thing. However, he says, a university professor has pointed out to the chemical industry that "you can't be caught doing good. You have to make a public commitment and tell the public what you are going to do and then you have to do it. Otherwise you will be accused of shooting an arrow at a barn and drawing the bull's eye wherever it hits." As part of their commitment to a safer industry, chemical companies are moving toward spending 3 to 4% of sales on safety and environmental projects, says Kennedy. In Carbide's case, that puts the tab at $300 million to $400 million annually. "If we need to spend another million or two to tell our employees and their communities what we are doing, it is peanuts compared to what we are already doing," he says. The sub-
Kennedy: don't trust us, track us
stance of that message to the public is "don't trust us, track us." And it is better, too, Kennedy acknowledges, when an employee reads what his or her company is doing in a local newspaper. "It makes it more believable than if it were to appear in a company memo." Kennedy realizes that all these industry initiatives will "not satisfy environmentalists by a long shot." But they are an attempt to meet the criticism head on. And they are a far cry from the days when the U.S. government enacted the first clean air and Superfund laws and industry was on the defensive. Indeed, with the passage of those laws, it was hard to be anything but on the defensive, he says. "Now industry realizes and accepts the fact that environmental costs are a built-in societal cost for doing business. We've got to follow principles of waste minimization and appropriate disposal so that what we do now is not a problem for future generations." On.e example of industry getting out in front of an issue and dealing head on with a potential problem is its agreement to phase out the use of chlorinated fluorocarbons. It is time, Kennedy believes, for all parties, to talk together reasonably. He recalls problems Carbide had in its effort to site a new plant in Arizona (C&EN, Jan. 7, page 15). One community group stridently opposed the company's proposed new plant. "Someone from Carbide down there," he says, "came up with a phrase—'If you won't overexaggerate the fears, we'll agree not to minimize the risks'—I like that. It does away with a pejorative approach. It has a ring of reason to it." The quality of t h e education young people receive in schools is another major concern for Kennedy. He was present in Washington, O.C., on April 18 when President Bush announced the Administration's America 2000 program to restructure and revitalize the U.S. educational system. The President's proposals aim to establish national standards for what children should learn in math, science, English, history, and geography. The program also calls for national exams to assess how well students meet standards.
"The President gave a brilliant speech," says Kennedy. "It is clear to me he is not fooling," particularly in his choice of people to carry out the program. "Business is really behind educational reform. Teachers' unions, administrators, superintendents are all calling for revolutionary change in our system." But the problem, according to Kennedy, is that the "general public is still not quite sure if there is really a crisis or if it is an inner city crisis Over there.'" The public believes that the issues affecting public schools are moral, involving discipline, drugs, and teenage pregnancy, says Kennedy. While the public may think that the solution is a return to basic discipline, it is more complex than that. He believes the educational system must be measured on its ability to teach and not just on the syllabus requirement for a certain number of years of science or English education. "We must decide what we expect kids to know and set national standards." The object will be to "hold people in the educational system accountable for change." And so that educators can do the job, "we'll need staff development programs." Aside from corporate programs to adopt a school, there will be a need for further systemic change; "anything less won't cut it," Kennedy says. For example, "Some kids come from broken homes, others don't eat right. There is a need for more social services." To force systemic change in education will take 10 years, maybe more, says Kennedy. But schools absolutely must compete. The idea of national testing will tell schools how well they are competing in a world in which education really counts. "They need to know how they stand up to the Japanese" and others. And graduates will have to compete in a world where domestic markets will not be protected. Kennedy looks toward the establishment of a free trade agreement among the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. "It will be very good for the long run and create a powerful economic force." U.S. and Canadian corporations will invest in Mexico not for the cheap labor, but for the market opportunities, he says. D May 13, 1991 C&EN
15
Business
Aerosol output dipped to 2.88 billion units last year
for the overall growth in the catego ry. Most other subcategories, includ ing hair care products, were down. Household products, the second Aerosol production in the U.S. de largest category, with about 23% of creased about 1% last year, according the U.S. aerosol market, were flat. to the latest annual pressurized About 680 million units were filled products survey from the Chemical in 1990, the same as in 1989. Among Specialties Manufacturers Associa the subcategories, only cleaners tion. At CSMA's midyear meeting in bucked the downward trend, show Chicago, survey committee chair ing about 5% growth. man Thomas E. Moloney, director of The third-place automotive and marketing for American National industrial products category, which Can Co., revealed that an estimated accounts for about 14% of the total 2.88 billion container units were market, had shown steady growth in filled in 1990, compared with 2.91 the preceding seven years. But the billion in 1989. growth streak ended in 1990. Only CSMA blames the slight down 415 million units were filled, down ward shift mainly on the weaker more than 12% from 1989's 475 mil economy. It notes that personal lion units. A precipitous drop in re products, the largest category (repre ported fillings of refrigerants—only senting about 36% of the total mar 38.1 million units, down 60% from ket), did rebound from a sharp de last year's 96.1 million—accounted cline last year. The category totaled for much of the decline. 1.05 billion units, up about 3% from Paints and finishes remained in last year's 1.02 billion units. Shaving fourth place. Fillings amounted to lathers and deodorants accounted 350 million units, essentially un-
Billions of units
Aerosol output slipped slightly in 1990
1981 82 83 84 85
86 87 88 89 90
Source: Chemical Specialties Manufacturers Association
changed from 1989. Also showing no change from 1989 were food products, with 175 million units filled, and animal products (the smallest category), with 8 million units. Among the remaining prod uct categories, insect sprays totaled 190 million units, a 3.6% decline from the preceding year. Ward Worthy
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May 13, 1991 C&EN
