ChemScore 2025 ranks chemical giants for their performance on four detailed metrics. In each category, companies can score a maximum 25 points, giving a total of 100:

1. Transparency: rewards companies for publicly disclosing data on hazardous substances in their products and emissions.
2. Phase-out of persistent chemicals: assesses whether a company identifies, manages, and phases out persistent chemicals (such as PFAS) in its operations and supply chain.
3. Product portfolio: evaluates how many hazardous chemicals a company produces.
4. Safer solutions: assesses whether a company defines, develops, and promotes chemical products that are intrinsically safer for health and the environment.

The wide variation within the overall picture (see Table 1) provides concrete evidence that another path is not only possible, but makes good business sense. Company scores for each category of the index are highly differentiated, demonstrating that chemical management can realistically be improved:

Table 1: Highest and lowest scores by category

* 6 companies scored zero in this category

** 14 companies scored zero in this category

† 7 companies scored zero in this category

†† 22 companies scored zero in this category

‡ Only one company scored zero across all categories

Despite this potentially positive finding, the ChemScore ranking demonstrates that the world’s top chemical companies continue to rely overwhelmingly on the production of chemicals proven to be hazardous to health or the environment. Moreover, they are secretive about their production of these substances, and in most cases are making only feeble efforts to develop safer alternatives. In the analysis of key findings that follow below, we highlight positive achievements while calling out those companies that are exposing investors and customers to financial and reputational risk.

PFAS: a watershed moment

2025 is a watershed year in terms of corporate concern about PFAS and other persistent chemicals. Two ChemScore companies, including the world’s largest chemicals producer, have stated their intention to exit production using these toxic and highly persistent chemicals, over which global concerns are reaching fever pitch.

Half of these large chemical companies are now attempting to map their use and production of these chemicals:

• Asked in ChemScore whether they map PFAS use, 20 companies (50%) said they do.
• Almost one-third of companies (13, or 33%) say it is their general intention to phase out reduce or avoid persistent chemicals, the toxic group to which PFAS belong.
• Nine ChemScore companies acknowledge in public statements that there is a problem with this group as a whole.
• Persistence is problematic because, even if emissions are low, over time these substances accumulate to pose a toxic hazard.

“Considering the need to maintain high safety and environmental standards, BASF calls for substituting the use of PFAS in industrial equipment,” the company says in a new statement on its website. The German conglomerate, with sales of €65 billion last year, says it will phase out products formulated with PFAS. BASF says it enacted its PFAS ambition in May 2023. Although it did not provide a clear exit date, its sustainability manual indicates the phase-out must take place within five years.

BASF has already started to market PFAS-free alternatives, thereby increasing their score in the ChemScore index. The company now advertises 24 substances on ChemSec’s Marketplace website, which connects suppliers of safer alternatives with potential buyers.

Ecolab, the US-based chemicals multinational with $16 billion in sales last year, joined BASF in revealing it will exit PFAS. “By end of 2026, all chemical products manufactured by Ecolab with intentionally added PFAS will be removed from our global portfolio,” the company says in a statement. The move by Ecolab comes despite the Trump administration’s drive to dismantle pollution regulations.

These moves come three years after scandal-hit 3M, a central player in PFAS manufacture, announced it would exit PFAS manufacture and work to discontinue the use of PFAS across its product portfolio by the end of 2025. The company says it is on track to stop PFAS production this year, but it still generates major revenue from products containing PFAS. 3M faces multibillion-dollar payouts in the US and Europe for PFAS contamination.

ChemScore 2025 top scorers

The average ChemScore total of fewer than 16 points out of 100 is disappointing and confirms the scale of the problem to be tackled if the industry is to clean up its act. Indeed, the majority of companies score even lower than this average, which is boosted by a handful of better performers (see Figure 1) – the top five companies in the index are far ahead of the pack.

Figure 1: ChemScore totals, by company

1. Indorama Ventures: Leading on transparency

Best practice: Indorama states clearly that no hazardous chemicals meeting the criteria of Substances of Very High Concern (SVHC) are present in their products, either intentionally or unintentionally, and that it does not produce, purchase, or sell persistent chemicals.

Indorama Ventures, one of the world’s largest producers of polyester, has consistently ranked among the top three ChemScore companies. Last year, Indorama made an important step towards transparency by revealing its full global portfolio of hazardous substances. The Thailand-based multinational tops this year’s ranking thanks to:

• Its continuous efforts to implement sustainable chemicals management
• An unambiguous statement that PFAS are a concern because of their potential adverse effects, and that it does “not produce, purchase, or sell persistent chemicals”.

Many plastics producers refuse to renounce PFAS and other persistent chemicals – we urge them to follow Indorama’s lead.

Mr. Yash Lohia, Executive President of Petchem and Chairman of the ESG Council, Indorama Ventures, said: “This achievement reflects our strong commitment to responsible chemicals management, operational excellence, and sustainability. Our engagement with ChemScore and the IIHC helps us continuously raise our environmental performance and reinforces our leadership in driving a safer, more circular, and low-carbon future.”

2. Lanxess: Eliminating SVHCs

Best practice: Lanxess reports hazardous substance emissions in one comprehensive table for all sites, substance-by-substance. It has timed phase-out plans for all end products that contain more than a tiny amount of hazardous substances, and commits not to develop or market such products. It commits to increase the share of safer solutions to 100% by 2030.

When ChemScore launched in 2020, Lanxess’s product portfolio was heavily loaded with hazardous substances. Since then, the company has worked consistently to improve it. It now has an outspoken strategy to phase out Substances of Very High Concern (SVHCs) from all new products. It has a road map for phasing them out from current products, with clear deadlines and action plans. The company states that if it cannot find alternatives, it will cease production. In recent years, Lanxess has reduced the number of SIN List chemicals (the most hazardous) it uses by 70%.

The statement on SVHCs by Lanxess is a model of its kind, and the company’s reporting is also best practice. For this reason, Lanxess tops the index for producing safer products while scoring equal first for transparency (see Table 2).

Table 2: ChemScore top five companies, by category

† Best in category

* Rounded to nearest integer

A spokesperson for the company said: “At Lanxess we aim to continuously improve the sustainability performance of our product portfolio in line with our customers’ needs, who increasingly seek more sustainable and responsible solutions. The ChemScore rating and the engagement with the IIHC offer valuable external insight, helping us identify areas for improvement and strengthen our commitment to safer, more sustainable chemistry.”

3. SABIC: Leads on transparency

Best practice: SABIC publishes its full global chemicals portfolio, with volumes, on a substance-by-substance basis. It maps the presence of persistent chemicals and has a concept for safer solutions based on well-established criteria.

This Saudi Arabian multinational is the second-largest public company in the Middle East. It has the joint top score for transparency, exposing the usual excuse given by the sector for lack of disclosure — “confidential business information”. The company’s CEO said publicly in 2023 that SABIC knows its competitors’ volumes, and they know SABIC’s, so there is no reason not to disclose them. SABIC is one of the few ChemScore companies to have a public strategy to exit toxic substances, although when it comes to PFAS it is still far behind the frontrunners.

4. Ecolab: PFAS exit boosted ranking

Best practice: Ecolab scored high on reducing its hazardous product portfolio, and published 20 advertisements for safer chemicals on ChemSec Marketplace.

Ecolab’s decision to exit PFAS doubled their ChemScore ranking, taking them to fourth place with 35 points. “In these times of Trump, this is an American company with good sustainability DNA, that is not afraid to do the right thing, is blunt and outspoken in public, and is moving forward,” says Sonja Haider, Head of Sustainable Finance at ChemSec.

“Investors tell us: ‘You can’t achieve anything on sustainability in the US’. The example of Ecolab shows this is false,” she says.

5. Yara: fewer hazardous substances

Best practice: Yara scored the highest for reducing its hazardous product portfolio. The company monitors substances of concern through its internal chemical management tool and has a procurement strategy to avoid purchasing chemicals classified as persistent.

During the six years of ChemScore, Yara has made significant and sustained improvements. The company, one of the world’s largest fertiliser producers, topped last year’s ranking thanks to its continuous efforts to improve its chemicals management, and an important step towards transparency by revealing its full global portfolio of hazardous substances.

Bottom of the class

One company stands out for scoring zero in all four categories of the index. This is Chemours. In previous years, Chemours has communicated with us, it has a chemical management system in place and a code of conduct. The company markets a few safer alternatives, and it has worked to reduce waste.

But these were the easy points that almost all companies were rewarded for, which have been eliminated under the new methodology. Now it is more apparent, from a chemical pollution perspective, that Chemours is in danger of becoming a stranded asset. It is burdened with a legacy portfolio of hazardous substances. Indeed, the company has seen its share price fall almost 70% since a peak three years ago.

Henkel, the consumer-focused German multinational with €22 billion in sales last year, talks a good talk on sustainability. But it is reluctant to walk the talk. It scores zero in the index for transparency about its use of hazardous chemicals, and zero also for its share of safer chemicals. Because of its large consumer product portfolio, Henkel is wary about revealing its use of hazardous substances. Surprisingly, the old legacy chemical companies in Germany, such as Lanxess and BASF, score much better in all four categories.

Regional trends

Our updated methodology (see below) is tougher than in previous years, so most companies score low in the new ChemScore. Almost 75% score below the average total of 16.

Poor performance is global, however. Many European and American companies score below the average. North American companies score consistently worse (see Figure 2). Seven out of the bottom 10 companies are from the US.

Figure 2: Company ChemScore totals in the Americas region

New methodology: no more low-hanging fruit

After five years of ChemScore, we decided to update our methodology to reflect a changing reality. More than 70% of companies were now engaging with the index and taking it seriously. Valuable dialogues had been established. Many companies had already picked ChemScore’s low-hanging fruit. This year’s index therefore includes new tools to more clearly identify companies that are failing to improve their processes, and to reward those that do.

Meanwhile, many companies are engaging with the EU’s corporate sustainability reporting initiative CSRD, promising a flood of valuable new data. In China, India and Russia, there are similar attempts to understand the implications of non-financial indicators. We have taken these new European data into account.

Finally, PFAS have become a big priority for investors due to its severe financial consequences. So we boosted the importance of these substances in the index, and that of persistent chemicals overall.

We stopped scoring controversies – data were scarce, and there are specialist services that provide this information. We also removed circularity from the index. While hugely important, there is no standardisation, and therefore it is difficult to determine whether a substance or product contributes to the circular economy or what impact it has.

These changes were made after extensive and detailed discussions with institutional investors as well as the chemical companies themselves. They make the index a more accurate reflection of chemicals management.

As a result, we see an even bigger differentiation between companies than we did with the original methodology, and average scores are lower. However, the frontrunners and laggards under the new methodology are the same as with the old. We see this as confirmation that the updated index is capturing the same aspects of corporate behaviour, while increasing the pressure on companies to improve their toxic chemicals management. 

The ChemScore 2025 companies

ChemScore covers 40 of the largest global stock-listed companies with hazardous chemical portfolios. The companies have been chosen on the basis of:

• The size of their revenue;
• The size of their hazardous chemical portfolio;
• Investor interest in these companies.

To be able to do a thorough assessment, we focus on 40 companies this year.