NOT CURRENT YEAR

Grade D-
ChemScore report card 2021

Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical

About the company

Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical is a subsidiary company of Sinopec and one of the largest petrochemical enterprises in China. The company processes crude oil into a broad range of synthetic fibres, resins, plastics, intermediate petrochemical products and petroleum products.
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Total score
4 / 48

Grade summary

Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical came in last in the previous ranking and continues this year in the same fashion, albeit sharing the lowest score (4 points in total) with Formosa. The company produces 10 highly hazardous chemicals. The production of problematic chemicals is one reason for the poor score, but also the fact that there’s no available data for over 90 percent of the of the company’s production, which takes place outside of the EU and US. This low transparency is a big issue for investors as it makes it hard to do a proper evaluation of the risks connected to the product portfolio. Like all companies in the ranking, Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical has been encouraged to share information about its production but it has declined to do so.

Opportunities for improvement

  1. Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical should reduce its hazardous portfolio, which currently consists of ten banned, severely restricted or SIN-listed substances. Quite many, considering we only have data for 9% of the company’s total production. Chemical pollution has a harmful impact on human health and the environment, and poses a growing threat. Two million people died due to exposure to hazardous chemicals in 2019, compared to 1.56 million in 2016, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Hazardous chemicals are also key drivers of biodiversity loss, putting entire ecosystems in jeopardy.
  2. Along with its Chinese peer Wanhua Chemical and Taiwanese Formosa Chemicals & Fibre Corporation, Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical is the taillight of the ChemScore ranking. The company lacks all the critical parts of a proper chemical management strategy: Assessment of products intrinsic hazardous properties, plans to phase out hazardous chemicals as well as development of safer and circular alternatives.
  3. Sinopec and its subsidiaries, including Sinopec Shanghai, are known for numerous environmental violations, including illegal discharges of toxic substances into rainwater drains, chronic river pollution, and serious pollution accidents. The company should revise its safety measures and invest heavily in employee training.

Category breakdown

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Product Portfolio
1 / 18

Sinopec produces/uses 10 highly hazardous substances –10 SIN List chemicals, no PICs, and 1 HHP – 1 of which is included on the EU’s REACH Candidate List. None of these highly hazardous substances are either banned or severely restricted, with set dates when production needs to cease (no Authorisation List substances, and no POPs). The company produces no persistent chemicals.

Please note that there is no available data for the 91 percent of the company’s production that takes place outside of the EU and US. Lower EU/US production means higher uncertainty with regard to the total production of hazardous chemicals, which will have a negative impact on the company’s score in this category.

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Development of Safer Chemicals
1 / 12

Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical has a method in place to screen and assess the sustainability of its products, but does not include the intrinsic hazards of ingredients in the screening process. Nor does it exclude substances with toxic properties from its new products. Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical does not actively market safer alternatives on its own website or on ChemSec Marketplace. The company has no true circular product, process or innovation. Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical does not use biobased resources. Nor does it source and treat recycled materials in a sustainable way, which is one of the key elements of a circular economy. Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical is not actively reducing the hazardous waste it generates.

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Management & Transparency
2 / 12

The Chinese company does not produce only sustainable products. Nor does it have a phase-out strategy for hazardous substances that go beyond regulatory compliance. It shares chemical safety information on its website and is following a credible code of conduct standard. Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical did not respond to ChemSec’s attempts to communicate around its ChemScore ranking. Nor does it share any information about what kind of chemicals it produces in regions with low regulatory demands for transparency (e.g. Asia).

 

Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical does not have a circular economy program in place, thus lacking objective and measurable circular economy targets.

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Lack of Controversies
0 / 6

Sinopec and its subsidiaries are known for numerous environmental violations, including illegal discharges of toxic substances into rainwater drains, chronic river pollution and serious pollution accidents. Several explosions at Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical’s facilities have also been reported. In 2013, for example, an explosion at an oil pipeline killed 62 and injured 136 people due to crude oil being leaked into the municipal drainage pipes. Five years later, a benzene tank explosion killed six people.

Download Controversies Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical (PDF, 125 KB)

How did we come to this score?

Do you want to know more about our methodology and how we rank the companies at ChemScore?

Read more about our methodology
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Overall rank
50 / 50
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Total score
4 / 48
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Product Portfolio
1 / 18
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Development of Safer Chemicals
1 / 12
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Management & Transparency
2 / 12
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Lack of Controversies
0 / 6
Documents
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Other years
Year Rank Total score
2022 53 / 54 2 / 48
2021 50 / 50 4 / 48
2020 35 / 35 5 / 48