Interview: Currenta CEO Hilken Plans to Make Chempark Europe’s Chemical Flagship

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“Energy Autonomy Was Never Our Goal”

To what extent has Chempark achieved energy autonomy and where will you be in five years?

Hilken: That degree of energy autonomy was never one of our goals. We are also a producer, work together with partners at the sites and purchase electricity from third parties. This model has worked very well. We are convinced that, based on our in-house energy business expertise, we will be able to successfully manage energy supply and demand in the future as well.

Yes, but the major shift in energy policy and the demise of nuclear power in Germany will certainly have an impact on your sites.

Hilken: It is a fact that industrial electricity prices in Germany are about 20 percent higher than in countries like Belgium and France. We, and by that I mean Germany’s leading chemical companies, are getting our message across at the political level to ensure that energy-intensive industries in the country can remain competitive.

One of our most important tasks is to ensure that the government and society at large have an awareness and understanding of the challenges which our industry faces in the competitive international marketplace. It is also important to keep in mind that we are playing an active and constructive role as the energy transition takes place.

As an energy customer with constant demand, we help stabilize the grids. We utilize steam at an efficiency level exceeding 90 percent, something that cannot be achieved at conventional power stations. In the wake of the energy transition, we will have to reconcile the needs of society with our need to remain competitive as an energy-intensive industry.

It is certainly problematic that the German economy affords the luxury of redundancy to a certain extent. At times when there is not enough wind or sunlight, we have to rely on conventional power stations. This will remain the case until sufficient storage capacity becomes available (i.e. 2020). Besides the stabilizing effect on the grid, a chemical park can make a significant contribution in other ways. The industry is working intensively on the development of energy storage solutions.

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