SusChem: Opinion on Green and Sustainable Chemistry

The first issue of Elsevier's Current Opinion in Green and Sustainable Chemistry contains an article from SusChem on the 'European chemical industry's contribution to sustainable development' by Pierre Barthelemy and Esther Agyeman-Budu. The paper was presented at the inaugural Green and Sustainable Chemistry Conference that took place in Berlin on 3 to 6 April. SusChem board member Prof Klaus Kümmerer, Director of the Institute for Sustainable and Environmental Chemistry at Leuphana University Lüneburg was the chair of the conference organising committee.

The paper examines the role of chemical research and innovation as a key enabling factor in achieving a sustainable and equitable global society and shows how the European chemical sector is a key player in the global chemical and pharmaceutical market and has been working to improve its own sustainability for many decades.

The paper features how initiatives such as SusChem are developing new solutions that will further reduce the environmental impact of the sector, while boosting its energy and resource efficiency, and introducing new materials and processes based on renewable resources for use by society. Moreover these innovative solutions catalyse sustainability in other sectors and value chains and will help realise concepts such as a truly circular economy. Finally the paper shows how effective implementation of such solutions requires close cooperation between government, industry and research bodies.

SusChem blog readers can access the full article for free here until 9 October 2016. The link will take you to the article on ScienceDirect. No sign up or registration should be needed - just click and read!

Current opinion
Elsevier’s Current Opinion series of journals were developed out of the recognition that it is increasingly difficult for specialists to keep up to date with the expanding volume of information published in their subject.

Current Opinion in Green and Sustainable Chemistry covers:

• The views of experts on current advances in Green and Sustainable Chemistry in a clear and readable form.
• Evaluations of the most interesting papers, annotated by experts, from the great wealth of original publications.
• All chemical aspects along the life cycle of chemicals as well chemical products and materials, for example resources, synthesis, use and after life issues.

Full article title: European chemical industry's contribution to sustainable development. Article reference: COGSC10 Journal title: Current Opinion in Green and Sustainable Chemistry Corresponding author: Dr. Pierre Barthelemy. Full bibliographic details: Current Opinion in Green and Sustainable Chemistry  (2016), pp. 28-32 DOI information: 10.1016/j.cogsc.2016.08.002