Global
Factbook
BASF Verbund
Our unique Verbund concept is one of BASF’s greatest strengths. Its driving principle is to add value through the efficient use of resources. At our Verbund sites, production plants, energy and material flows, logistics, and site infrastructure are all integrated.
BASF currently operates six Verbund sites worldwide: two in Europe, two in North America and two in Asia. Our Verbund site in Ludwigshafen, Germany, is the world’s largest chemical complex owned by a single company that was developed as an integrated network. We are building a seventh Verbund site in Zhanjiang, in the Chinese province of Guangdong.
BASF Verbund sites worldwide
The Verbund system creates efficient value chains that extend from basic chemicals all the way to industrial and final consumer products. In this system, chemical processes make use of energy more efficiently, achieve higher product yields and conserve resources. By-products of one process are used as starting materials for other processes. This saves raw materials and energy, avoids emissions, lowers logistics costs and leverages synergies. BASF operates 228 additional production sites worldwide, but the six Verbund sites produce more than 50% of our volumes. This is a testament to the importance and strength of the Verbund concept within BASF.
Value chains in integrated Verbund structures can be steered efficiently to conserve resources and reduce CO2 emissions. In 2023, we covered 51% of BASF Group’s electricity demand with our own gas and steam turbines in highly efficient combined heat and power plants. Compared with separate generation of steam and electricity, we saved 10.8 million MWh of fossil fuels and avoided 2.2 million metric tons of carbon emissions in 2023.1 In 2023, internally generated power in the BASF Group had a carbon footprint of around 0.26 metric tons of CO2 per MWh of electricity and was below the national grid factor at most BASF sites.
The Verbund system is also key to the carbon-optimized supply of energy at our sites. For example, waste heat from one plant’s production process is used as energy in other plants. The Verbund saved us around 17.3 million MWh in 2023, which translates to 3.5 million metric tons less CO2 released into the atmosphere.1 With combined power and steam generation as well as our continuously optimized Energy Verbund, we were thus able to avoid a total of 5.7 million metric tons of CO2 emissions in 2023.
1 Calculation basis: electricity conversion efficiency of conventional power plants: 45%; steam generation efficiency 90%
Despite its complexity, the Production Verbund can respond flexibly to fluctuating demand and changing framework conditions. BASF also has flexibility in adapting its Verbund structures, as demonstrated by the measures to improve competitiveness of the Ludwigshafen site that were announced in February 2023. As part of these measures, the following plants were shut down by the end of 2023: the TDI complex, one ammonia plant, the melamine plant and the fertilizer facility. Further shutdowns will be implemented gradually until the end of 2026.