Our modern society and global economy depend on substances that if not handled, stored, transported, or secured properly, could cause harm. These substances serve as critical components for medicines, plastics, automobiles, and building materials to name just a few. In today’s world, there is concern that chemical facilities could be attacked by or chemicals could be used by those who wish to intentionally cause harm disrupting our way of life.
Dow’s Position
The Dow Chemical Company will not compromise on our commitment to security and safety nor will we concede our leadership position setting the standard for all others to follow. This is our business. Our commitment to the security and safety of our sites, products, and communities -- where we live and work -- has always been deeply embedded in our company’s culture and our business processes.
Without government mandate or regulation, Dow has decisively acted -- building upon our strong foundation of safety and security -- to permanently heighten our level of security and invest hundreds of millions of dollars in security and manufacturing safety upgrades globally. But, we never consider our work done. We constantly assess the risks to facilities, supply chain, and information systems.
While the primary responsibility for public security rests within the role of governments around the world, Dow is strongly committed to working with industry and governments wherever we operate to help address safety and security needs. We strongly support national legislation in the United States to establish uniform, risk-based performance standards and are driving industry efforts around the globe that will help bring all chemical manufacturers up to our standards.
Dow’s Actions
- Dow is relentless in leading the entire industry in security and manufacturing safety. As a strong advocate -- our work in these areas has been and will continue to be thorough and extensive.
- Without government mandate or regulation, Dow has decisively acted in response to the heightened security threats by permanently heightening our level of security and constantly upgrading our process safety approaches.
- Dow will continue to work closely with communities and local responders so that we can all successfully respond to every type of risk. These same first responders have reviewed the improvements we have made and continue to make.
- Security experts and engineers that understand how our products are made work together to assess the vulnerability of all our manufacturing facilities worldwide using rigorous methodology developed by leading scientists and engineers from the U.S. Government’s Sandia National Labs.
- We have expanded comprehensive risk assessment programs to evaluate security around transportation of raw materials and products. We work closely with our logistics partners to assess the effectiveness of their safety and security programs.
- Dow has integrated cyber security and information protection into its overall security efforts and has taken a leadership role in driving cyber security guidelines for the rest of the chemical industry.
Dow's Timeline
