From cement and steel producers to the makers of plastics, European companies facing increasingly stringent limits onindustrial emissions are trying to come up with creative ways to transform the pollution they produce.

HeidelbergCement AG is using blast-furnace slag in concrete, aiming to cut carbon dioxide emissions by a quarter this year compared with 1990. ThyssenKrupp AG plans to re-purpose gases emitted by its steel smelter into saleable products such as methanol. And Bayer AG’s Covestro plastics unit is chemically converting CO2 into an ingredient in the foams used in mattresses and sports equipment.

The efforts, all in place before the scandal on cheating emissions rules at Volkswagen AG, represent a new thrust in the drive to limit global warming. Companies being pushed to trim emissions are trying to do so in a way that also boosts profit. With envoys from more than 190 nations working with the United Nations to tie down a deal this year that will limit pollution everywhere, the pressure can only get more intense.

“I don’t see a chance for a CO2 intensive industry in Europe if we aren’t able to demonstrate a solution,” said Reinhold Achatz, ThyssenKrupp’s head of research and development, in an interview in Essen.

David Fuller's view

Will stoic German consumers buy CO2 mattresses?  Probably and all these efforts are a good idea, at least until we hear that trees and all other plants are suffering because there is insufficient CO2 in our air, water and soil.