Sumitomo Chemical

As a major Japanese chemical company, Sumitomo Chemical Company specialises in basic chemicals, petrochemicals, and fine chemicals such as photo-resists, pharmaceutical intermediates and agrochemicals. The Tokyo-based chemical company is a member of the Sumitomo Group and operates manufacturing plants and sales offices worldwide.

Total score

16 / 48

Grade summary

Sumitomo Chemical produces 6 hazardous substances. This may not seem too bad compared to the other companies in the ranking, but it’s still a product portfolio full of problematic substances. In addition, there is no available data for…

Product Portfolio

3 / 18

Sumitomo produces/uses 6 highly hazardous substances – 5 SIN List chemicals, 1 PIC, 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 (no Authorisation List substances, and no POPs). The company produces no persistent chemicals.

Please note that there is no available data for the 79 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.

Development of Safer Chemicals

5 / 12

Sumitomo Chemical has a method in place to screen and assess the sustainability of its products and includes the intrinsic hazards of ingredients in the screening process. It does not, however, exclude substances with toxic properties from its new products. Sumitomo Chemical actively markets safer alternatives both on its own website as well as on ChemSec Marketplace. The company has no true circular product, process or innovation. Sumitomo Chemical 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. Sumitomo Chemical is not actively reducing the hazardous waste it generates.

Management & Transparency

2 / 12

The Japanese company does not produce only sustainable products, and has no 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. Sumitomo Chemical did not respond to ChemSec’s attempts to communicate around its ChemScore ranking and it does not share any information about what kind of chemicals it produces in regions with low regulatory demands for transparency (e.g. Asia). Sumitomo Chemical does not have a circular economy program in place, thus lacking objective and measurable circular economy targets.