Why the chemical industry hasn’t changed in 100 years - Peter Meek

Pearl GTL, Ras Laffan Qatar

As pressure builds across global supply chains, attention is starting to shift from individual disruptions to the underlying systems that drive them.

The global chemical industry — worth over $4 trillion annually — is still built on a model developed more than a century ago.

That model has been incredibly effective. It enabled scale, reduced costs, and supported the growth of modern industry. But it also locked production into a centralised structure - one that is increasingly exposed to volatility in energy, feedstocks, geopolitics, and global trade.

HydGene Head of Engineering Peter Meek continues his LinkedIn series, exploring why the chemical industry looks the way it does today — and why that structure is now under pressure.

In his latest article, A $4 Trillion Industry Built on a 100-Year-Old Idea, Peter breaks down how this system was built, why it became so centralised, and what a different model could look like.

This is the system challenge HydGene is addressing.

Peter's series will continue weekly on LinkedIn. Follow Peter Meek and HydGene Renewables to stay across the conversation.