Rhodia

In 2009, Rhodia acquired two companies: OneCarbon International and the McIntyre Group (specialized surfactants, United States). In 2009, the Belgian chemicals group Solvay launched a friendly public takeover bid for Rhodia. In 2010, Rhodia acquired an 87% stake in the capital of Feixiang Chemicals. On January 1, 2011, Rhodia set up a new organization. Operational activities are now organized in 11 business units, in five sectors of activity: Consumer Chemicals, Advanced Materials, Polyamide Materials, Acetow & Eco Services, and Energy Services. The additional Support Function Group includes corporate activities.

On March 8, 2011, Rhodia announced the finalization of the acquisition of the Suzhou HiPro Polymers guar derivatives production plant in Zhangjiagang, China and on April 13, 2011, Rhodia completed the acquisition of the engineering plastics activity of the Indian company PI Industries Ltd (PIIL), following the approval of the Indian authorities.

In September 2011, Solvay's tender offer on Rhodia was completed and Rhodia became a sector of the Solvay group.

Debt from Rhône-Poulenc

After its breakaway from Rhône-Poulenc, Rhodia had to cope with the repercussions of soil pollution and financial liabilities. Prominent figures, such as Thierry Breton and the Swiss banker Édouard Stern, were involved in trying to work out solutions. The group's balance sheet-based structure remained fragile due to negative equity. On December 31, 1999, Rhodia's debt inherited from the split with Rhône-Poulenc amounted to €1,540 million.

In an attempt to solve the group's debt problem, management renegotiated a debt estimated at €1 billion in 2010 (Rhodia's lowest debt level since the group was created). Declared tangible investments in 2009 totaled €167 million, compared with €241 million in 2008.

Commitment to Sustainable Development

In 2003, Rhodia set up a department dedicated to sustainable development. In 2007, it rolled out the "Rhodia Way", the group's reference framework of responsibilities toward stakeholders. Group employees can use this reference system to self-assess the performance of their entity in terms of social and environmental responsibility, to encourage more responsible practices.

Energy Services

Energy Services is responsible for energy supplies and the management of Rhodia's projects to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Energy management embraces the purchasing, production, and sale of energy. In the field of purchasing, mainly of gas and electricity, Energy Services managed €630 million of energy purchases in 2009, 68% of which were for Rhodia's own needs, while the remaining 32% were for third parties, notably for the Group's partners in its joint ventures.

In France, Rhodia is the second-biggest industrial buyer of gas and one of the top ten purchasers of electricity.

Energy Services has invested in biogas technology by acquiring the Econcern group's share of six biogas production pilots in China and Vietnam.

With revenues of €203 million in 2010, Energy Services represents 4% of the Rhodia Group's turnover and operates four industrial plants in Brazil, China, France, and Vietnam.

In 2010, Rhodia Energy Services developed its "Climate Care" solutions for the production of energy from renewable biological materials. Two biogas projects in China, and Vietnam and the partnership between the private company Paraiso and Eco Services in Brazil have provided an opportunity to develop a biomass project based on bagasse.

Production sites

Rhodia has 65 production sites worldwide.

Europe

Rhodia has 22 production sites in Europe, including 10 in France.

The Rhodia Group is present in Germany (Freiburg), Italy (Ospiate), Poland, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) (Sertow LLC), Spain and the United Kingdom.

La Rochelle

According to ANDRA, the French agency for waste management, until July 1994, Electronics and Catalysis (now Rhodia Rare Earth Systems) used very slightly radioactive monazite as an ore, producing radium-bearing waste, which was initially stored at ANDRA's La Manche center until 1991, then in the French atomic energy commission's Cadarache facility.

The treatment of the slightly radioactive monazite produced 8,023 tons (according to ANDRA) of slightly radioactive solid residue up until 1994. According to ANDRA, in 2007, this residue contained 2,000 tons of uranium and 2.6 tons of toxic lead.

The plant is subject to ICPE environmental surveillance.

A project to launch a recycling plant for the rare earth contained in used lightbulbs is being looked into.

Asia-Pacific

Rhodia currently includes a Rhodia-Asia-Pacific zone (CIS, Middle East, and Africa), managed by Michel Ybert, with an operational head office in Shanghai. This zone has 21 production sites and accounted for 29% of Rhodia's revenues in 2010.

The Asia-Pacific support functions—finance, HR, purchasing, and IT—are based in Singapore

The Asia Pacific zone includes production activities in China, Japan, Thailand, India, and Indonesia, plus commercial activities in China, Japan, and Korea.

South America

The Rhodia Group has three production sites in Brazil and one in Venezuela.

North America

The Rhodia Group has 18 sites spread across the United States.

Rhodia opération SAS

Located on the banks of the Deûle canal, near Lille in Northern France, the ICPE chemical works was founded by Frédéric Kuhlmann, who started with a small two-hectare chemical factory that he bought in 1847. The factory then belonged to the Rhône-Poulenc Chemicals group, which became Rhodia. During a working lifetime of 150 years, the site grew from two to 33 hectares, in the neighborhoods of La Madeleine, Saint-André-lez-Lille and Marquette-lez-Lille.

Between 1961 and 2001, the site produced highly toxic Toluene diisocyanate (TDI), which is one of the basic components used to produce polyurethane foam. Until December 2005, the tar produced by the synthesis of the TDI was incinerated on-site.

The group abandoned the site, and the last remaining remnants—the two 80-meter-high smoke stacks built in 1929 and 1933—were demolished. Until 2006, a store, a plant, and a backup store of oleum remained on the site 3,000 m3 of earth from the old branch railway were stored on the site and part of the plot was bought by the FICHAUX coffee roasting company.

2008 report on pollution

Various studies, supervised by the French regional agency for industry and research, DRIRE, revealed serious pollution by heavy metals (zinc, copper and lead) almost everywhere on the site, plus mercury and cadmium in one area and nitrates, sulfates, ammonium and arsenic by the Deûle canal.

Certain pollutants had percolated into the soil and polluted the surface groundwater: potassium, sulfates, nitrates, nitrites, chlorides, ammonium and sodium, and locally, zinc and cadmium, to depths of up to 2 m in the so-called ANS sector, plus arsenic under the AS/PS sector and manganese under the GMG sector.

This groundwater rose when the industrial pumps were stopped and flooded the basements in nearby houses, requiring permanent pumping to drain the subsoil.

Severe pollution by arsenic was discovered up to depths of 5 meters in the AS/PS sector, plus mercury in the northeast half of this same sector

The chalk layer under the site was contaminated by sulfates.

For these reasons, the local authorities deemed that the site was compatible with industrial usage, but with restrictions to be applied on a case-by-case basis with the potential buyers of the various parts of the site, on a long-term and mandatory basis for third parties through publication in the land registry. The Lille city authorities considered locating a purification plant on the site.

Several projects for the industrial, urban, or administrative use of the site are in progress. The position of the site in an area designated as “green belt” on the banks of the Deûle, the pollution, and its highly artificial character make it an important factor in the ecological fragmentation of the regional "blue infrastructure".