1. Introduction
Sustainable innovation in the global chemical industry can take
different forms. Companies may make their existing manufacturing
processes more efficient, reorganize their research and development
functions to focus on environmentally-friendly technologies
such as green chemistry, or impose environmental performance
standards on suppliers. Since the 1990s, many companies have
moved from pollution prevention to green chemistry as a more
fundamental way to achieve sustainability. Green chemistry d
a broad term referring to chemical production that aims to reduce
environmental and health hazards and to advance sustainability
(Clark and Deswarte, 2008) d aligns with the industry’s basic
business strategy of achieving growth through new products and
process technologies (Arora et al., 2001). Companies have focused
on green chemistry process innovations that make conventional
chemical production more efficient and less costly (Eder, 2003;
Radonjic and Tominc, 2007). Yet companies could also concentrate
on developing new processes and technologies that meet current market demand, or even create new market demand for innovative,
environmentally-friendly products. A major challenge, then, is to
find ways to integrate sustainable innovation in this vein into the
chemical industry’s business models.
The case of bioplastics illustrates how business models can play
a central role in linking producers and customers through the
development of new technologies and products. Faced with
growing environmental concerns from consumers and governments,
as well as unpredictable, high fossil fuel prices, many
established chemical companies have explored producing polymers
from renewable biomass feedstock such as corn and sugarcane.
Although the use of biomass to produce chemicals is not
novel, scientific advances over the last decade in industrial
biotechnology have diminished the costs of converting organic
material into platform chemicals that can supply most other
chemical manufacturing streams, such as polymers (Carole et al.,
2004). The European Technology Platform for Sustainable Chemistry
estimates that up to 30 percent of raw materials for the
European chemical industry could come from renewable sources by
2025 (SusChem, 2005). Yet to date, biobased chemical production is
tiny compared to conventional chemicals. Further, although biobased
product lines could lessen the negative environmental and
social impacts associated with petroleum feedstock (O’Rourke and