Progressing product safety

Throughout the many value chains of the products we make, we emphasize safety, product stewardship, regulatory compliance, and science-based advocacy.

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Image United Nations Sustainable Development Goals related to this content.
United Nations Sustainable Development Goals related to this content.

This work includes:

  • Issuing safety data sheets.
  • Labeling products accurately.
  • Addressing regulatory developments.
  • Supporting our customers’ safe use and disposal of our products.

We develop testing methods and models for our own use, and we collaborate with others to inform our efforts and share what we know. We factor in relevant data about health, environmental exposure, and use of our products. This information is communicated to employees and customers to help mitigate potential impacts of our products.

Our approach

We aim to provide the energy and products the world needs in a way that helps to protect human health and the environment.

Our scientists are at the forefront of product safety research. We work to identify and manage risks associated with our products and provide the appropriate level of safety for people and the environment.

Our Product Safety Policy is part of our Standards of Business Conduct and is incorporated into our management systems. It is consistent with external product safety standards, including those provided by the American Chemistry Council Product Safety Code.

Product standards and safe handling

Our chemicals, lubricants, and fuels products meet or exceed applicable regulations, standards, and guidelines. These include:

Zero

work-related workforce (employee or contractor) fatalities caused by product incidents in transport from 2017 through 2024.

Zero

high-consequence product stewardship-related incidents in our Fuels, Lubricants, and Chemicals businesses again in 2024.

We also apply relevant standards for product safety where no regulations exist to enable communication of product safety aspects to our customers. We work to identify and manage risks associated with our products and to avoid products that cannot meet an appropriate level of safety.

Safety and environmental standards also apply to the transport of our products. Periodic risk assessments are part of our transportation processes and help us to find opportunities to further avoid and mitigate risk. Examples include using GPS to track movements and our work with intermodal providers on positive train control – a method to avoid collisions.

We share good practices and promote safe transport of our products with industry peers and emergency responders through regular engagements, and we continue to improve training for first responders both inside and outside our company.

 

Measuring performance

We monitor our performance based on our established safety standards.

A key internal metric we use to track the success of our product safety management system is the total number of high-consequence product stewardship-related incidents. A high-consequence incident is measured through a combination of potential impacts including safety, health, environmental, and regulatory.

Communication and collaboration

Our Product Stewardship Information Management System (PSIMS) is the primary way we share potential product hazards and risks with our customers. The safety data sheets in our PSIMS include details on safe handling, transport, use, and disposal of our products.

In 2015, ExxonMobil signed on to the Responsible Care® Global Charter – a unifying long-term commitment to the safe management of chemicals.

Since 2021, we have focused on continuous improvement of our PSIMS. This ongoing project is designed to improve the accessibility and clarity of our product formulas and to expand our supplier data. This upgrade provides key personnel at the manufacturing sites access to the most current product safety information.

We collaborate with industry, academia, regulators, and policy makers to help ensure that the best available science informs industry product safety policy. Groups we work with include:

In 2024, we actively managed a library of more than

100,000

safety data sheets, in compliance with the regulations of the countries where we operate.
We successfully distributed more than

200,000

safety data sheets to customers across 150 countries.

SPOTLIGHT

Thought leadership from ExxonMobil Biomedical Sciences

The multi-faceted research led by ExxonMobil Biomedical Sciences (EMBSI) directly informs operations and processes at ExxonMobil. Their diverse team of more than 75 scientists conducts research in various fields including epidemiology, toxicology, and environmental sciences. EMBSI also oversees toxicity testing associated with product registration, develops safety information to support the safe use of our products, and conducts evidence-based risk assessments.

Since 2014, EMBSI scientists have published more than 270 peer-reviewed papers (which can be found online at Web of Science). In that time, experts from the EMBSI team have also given more than 900 technical presentations to science conferences, regulatory agencies, and academia. Among them were the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, the Society of Toxicology, and the International Society of Exposure Sciences.

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