Over the past 25 years, Green Chemistry has provided a unique forum for the publication of innovative research on the development of alternative sustainable technologies, efficient utilisation of resources and the concomitant minimisation of waste. We are delighted to bring together a very special issue containing articles by members of the green chemistry community as well as past and present Green Chemistry Board members, to mark and celebrate our first 25 years.
Among the contributions to this themed collection is paper that offers insights into an assessment approach for evaluating the environmental sustainability of either single chemical transformations or entire processes (DOI: 10.1039/D4GC00302K). It adopts a multi-dimensional framework, presented in a practical and systematic manner. This approach relies on a clear starting point for all assessments, making use of available data, simulating missing data, to allow for fair comparisons. This comes to improve on the too often used mono-dimensional analyses that have by now proven a potential source for incorrect conclusions and decisions.
Read our interview with the authors, Michael U. Luescher and Fabrice Gallou:
How would you set this article in a wider context?
While we do understand that our methodology is far from being 100% accurate, it has proven its reliability against more complex LCA-methodologies in identifying environmental hotspots. This more pragmatic approach enables us to look at, and impact, entire portfolios of industrial companies and guide research interest enabling real returns in the longer term. Besides, we believe that this article should be seen as steppingstone and a first step towards the next generation of metrics, moving away from the one-dimensional approaches, that have served us well in the past and brought us up to this point, and gearing towards LCA-type of analysis.
What is the motivation behind this work?
Moving away from opinions and one-dimensional assessments, we looked to establish a method to take data driven, educated, sound decisions on a large scale. The timing of such assessments becomes more critical as many transformations can now be done using multiple technologies, which can require extensive investment, and whose overall footprint is not necessarily well understood. Hence the need to establish more tools to support our decision-making process.
What aspects of this work are you most excited about at the moment and what do you find most challenging about it?
We are very excited at how our methodology has been performing within our organization, the impact it had on our decision taking, and hope that we can share these learnings with the wider community, as we do not consider this a competitive advantage. It is all the more exciting as it has proven to bring real value in terms of multiple aspects of sustainability and can lead to good decisions with tremendous impact on the planet!
What is the next step? What work is planned?
We plan to further streamline the methodology, implementing it company wide, and to illustrate in the future how this approach has helped us select the better options which led to significant impact on the footprint of the syntheses and processes at stake.
Why did you choose to publish in Green Chemistry?
Green Chemistry has had a long history of gathering the community and disclosing high quality content. It has in our mind further increase its leadership position and authoritative position in this field in the recent years and was thus the obvious choice for us.
What do you think the Green Chemistry journal has done well in the past 25 years, and what do you think are the main challenges our community will face in the next 25 years?
In a first phase, the journal has had tremendous impact raising awareness and educating. More recently, it has in our mind further stepped up being not just a source of inspiration and education, but also really pushing the boundaries of science with impact on sustainability.
