Dow, DuPont see increased benefits in building sustainable products

Chemical companies Dow Chemical Co and DuPont are seeing increased benefits in building sustainable "green" products, as they look for newer avenues of growth and build a stronger connection with millenials. A growing demand for healthy food and environment-friendly detergents was in part responsible for DuPont's better- than-expected second-quarter results on Tuesday."In the traditional chemicals (business) there is not a lot of innovation happening. They have to find new innovation drivers for competitive edge and biology is in that space," Bernstein analyst James Oxgaard said. "It's the millenials who are driving this demand." Consumer demand for healthier products should result in more sales of products such as probiotics, DuPont said on a call with analysts.Its Danisco business, which makes probiotic cultures and emulsifiers used in baking, helped boost margins in its nutrition and health unit by nearly 1 percentage point. Apart from food, both Dow and DuPont are working on building products such as detergents that do not need hot water to clean, or paints that remove formaldehyde - a chemical linked to certain cancers - from the air.