A New Circular Economy Concept for Textiles and Chemicals

The RESYNTEX conference in Brussels on 24 April 2019 marked the final phase of this exciting project. RESYNTEX was funded by the European Commission’s HORIZON 2020 Programme via a SPIRE Public Private Partnership call and started in June 2015 to create a new circular economy concept for the textile and chemical industries. Cefic is one of 20 partners involved in the project, which represented 10 different EU member states.

Major technological advances were achieved, one being the construction of a pilot installation in Slovenia. This site will demonstrate the whole symbiosis concept of RESYNTEX in an industrial environment with full integration of the sorting, pre-treatment, chemical and enzymatic processes, as well as liquid and solid waste treatment and water recycling.

With this installation, the RESYNTEX project moved into the real-world testing of its technology for chemical and biotechnological recycling of textile waste. To achieve large-scale industrial application, significant further technology development work is necessary and must be accompanied by smart regulatory and economic incentives.

 

The project may be coming to an end, but the project partners see plenty of opportunities to work towards a circular and low carbon economy with a key role for innovative chemical and biotechnological recycling technologies. Although fundamentally understood, such technologies are currently under-deployed for plastics circularity.  Further innovation, scale-up to demonstration, adoption of policies, and establishment of recycling-chains are needed to establish clear pathways for full-scale implementation to valorise post-use waste currently shipped, burnt or disposed of in landfill.

More information at www.resyntex.eu.

2017 LRI Innovative Science Award Ceremony and Workshop on Making Sense of ‘Omics’

The winner of the prestigious LRI Innovative Science Award, worth €100,000, will be announced at the opening gala dinner of the 19th annual Cefic Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) workshop on November 15-16 in Brussels. The topic of the main workshop is “Making Sense of Omics”. 


Cefic’s LRI Innovative Science Award is Europe’s biggest prize for early career life scientists. It finances outstanding research contributions developing novel approaches for assessing the potential impact of chemicals on human health and the environment.

The research undertaken by the LRI programme complements that done by SusChem with  focus on technology innovation and chemical safety/omics for regulatory applications.

Participants attending the 19th Annual Workshop have the opportunity to gain insights into the LRI programme and its future direction.

Omics: global perpectives
This year’s workshop theme is “Making Sense of Omics”. A dedicated session will discuss the regulatory applications of omics from a European and US perspective.  ‘Omics’ describes a wide portfolio of biology research areas including genomics, proteomics and  or metabolomics.

The event showcases the results from LRI Programme projects and their impact on pressing issues around the technical aspects of chemicals policy. Chemicals-related topics to be examined at the workshop by leading scientists involved in policy making in Europe, Canada and the USA include:

• Biodegradation
• Bioaccumulation
• Carcinogenicity
• Inhalation nanotoxicology

Key speakers
Key speakers of interest to the media include:

• Dr Albert Piersma - professor in reproductive toxicology at Utrecht University and Senior Scientist at the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment in the Netherlands, member of the Dutch Health Council and of advisory committees for the EU, OECD and WHO
• Dr Frank Gobas – environmental toxicologist at Simon Foster University, Canada and a member of scientific expert groups and advisory boards for the UN, the US Environment Protection Agency (EPA) and the Canadian government
• Dr Damian Helbing – assistant professor at the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University, USA

More information and registration
The LRI workshop takes place at two venues with the opening gala dinner and awards ceremony at Le Plaza Hotel in Brussels on the evening of 15 November with the workshop taking place at The Square conference facility in central Brussels on 16 November.

The full programme for the workshop is available here and you can register via this link. Participation is free.

Cefic - LRI 2017 programme call closes 31 August!

The Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) programme of the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) is now accepting grant applications, but you will need to be quick as the deadline for applications is 31 August 2017.

The Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) programme is a major voluntary initiative of the European chemical industry to support the long-term sustainability of its sector and European society. The programme funds work to identify the hazards posed by chemicals and improve the methods available for assessing the associated risks.

The LRI sponsors high-quality research of a standard publishable in a reputable peer-reviewed journal, and seeks to provide sound scientific advice on which industry and regulatory bodies can draw-on to respond quickly and accurately to the public’s concerns.

2017 call
The 2017 call covers research in the following areas:

• Bioaccumulation potential determination (ECO41)
• Fate-ecotoxicity testing and risk assessment (ECO42)
• Sediment toxicity testing refinement (ECO43)
• Toxicokinetics mammalian modelling (ECO44)
• Implementing an ecosystem services-based approach to chemical risk assessment: A proof of concept study (ECO45)
• Improvement of the environmental hazard and risk assessment of cationic polymers (ECO46)
• Assessment of inhalation and dermal exposure in industrial/professional use (B20)Interpretation of ‘omics (molecular-level interactions data):
• Development of omics data analysis (C4)
• Understanding normal adaptation vs pathology and gene expression time dependence (C5)
• Biological omics read-across (C6)

Further information on project specifications, budget details and application forms can be found on the Cefic-LRI website at:

Only proposals that fit the project specifications and are submitted via the official LRI application form will be considered for funding. For further details, please contact Dr. Bruno Hubesch, LRI Programme Consultant, or the LRI Secretariat via email.

The deadline for receipt of completed applications is 31 August 2017.

A mini-guide to the Cefic-LRI funding and application process can be downloaded here and results from a selection of completed Cefic-LRI projects can be found here.

About Cefic-LRI
The Cefic-LRI programme is all about a responsible approach to assessing the long-term impacts of chemicals.

Public awareness of the potential impact of human activity and man-made substances on the environment and on health is something the chemical industry has long taken seriously. As early as 1996, the need to address societal concerns and help public understanding of the long-term impacts led to the establishment of the Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) programme in the US. Cefic-LRI manages the LRI programme in Europe.

The LRI’s aim is to respond to public and stakeholder concerns through rigorous scientific investigation. In the last 17 years it has become a unique source of knowledge and tools, providing a validated infrastructure of scientific advice available to both the industry and regulatory bodies. In this way, the LRI helps to provide timely and accurate information in response to the public’s questions and concerns.

To help address some of European public health strategy priorities, LRI conducts peer-reviewed transparent research to:
-Improve risk assessment of chemicals and monitor the effects of chemicals on health;
-Understand the environmental factors in human health;
-Establish endocrine disruption references;
-Coordinate research, data and activities at a European level.

LRI also addresses many of the environmental objectives of the EU, including:
-Linking environmental factors to health effects;
-Understanding and reducing chemical risks to environment;
-Improving animal testing in risk assessment.

More rebel thinkers required for 2017 LRI Award!

Are you a real rebel thinker? Do you have a great idea for novel research in human health or environmental risk assessment? Then apply now for the Cefic-LRI Innovative Science Award 2017. But be quick - the closing date for applications is 19 March 2017.

The European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic), in conjunction with the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC), ), the Association of European Toxicologists and European Societies of Toxicology (EUROTOX), and the International Society of Exposure Sciences (ISES) is offering a €100,000 award to support promising new research in the field of dose-response of synergy in combined exposure to humans or environmental species. But you must apply by 19 March 2017!

New approaches to synergy needed
The risk assessment of combined exposures to multiple chemicals is largely based on the assumption that effects of chemicals acting via the same Adverse Outcome Pathway (AOP) / Mode of Action (MoA) can be estimated based on dose-addition, and that different AOPs/MoAs can be accounted for by response-addition models. The interaction of multiple chemicals that result in more-than-additive adverse effects (‘synergy’) is assumed to be rare and is mostly described for toxicokinetic interactions of pharmaceuticals at high doses.

Beyond the question of whether synergy can occur or not, the synergy dose-response is highly relevant for the risk assessment of moderate to low co-exposures to either humans or environmental species. But today our knowledge on the relevance of both exposure levels and mixture ratios on the occurrence and degree of synergy is limited.

So for 2017 the LRI Award is looking for new approaches and techniques that, in characterising synergy dose-response, will improve risk assessment of chemical co-exposures at environmentally relevant exposure levels. These could include:

• Experimental approaches to examine the dose-response of more-than-additive interactions of chemicals in relevant models of environmental or human health effect assessment
• Structure-activity modelling
• Mathematical modelling to integrate mechanistic and/or kinetic knowledge and experimental data from different models

Award objectives
The objective of this LRI Award is to stimulate innovative research, ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking and new approaches which will advance the development and application of new and existing approaches in the assessment of chemical safety.

The research should be complementary to the Long-range Research Initiative’s (LRI) objectives. LRI is a chemical industry funded programme that aims at enhancing scientific knowledge to help protect health and the environment.

The award is intended for a European-based scientist with less than ten years post-doctoral experience. Active involvement in interdisciplinary research, current academic track record, and access to appropriate networks will be considered in the selection. There is no age limit for applicants.

Applicants must submit a two-page project proposal by mid- March. Short-listed researchers are then requested to send in a more detailed description of their work, after which the three finalists are selected to present their proposal before a jury panel in Brussels. This year the final selection in Brussels will be on June 2017.

The winning proposal of the LRI Innovative Science Award will be officially presented at the LRI Annual Workshop on 15 November 2017. The 2017 Awardee will be expected to present the results of the research supported by the Award at the LRI Annual Workshop in November 2018.

The Cefic-LRI Innovative Science Award was established in 2004 to inspire highly innovative and industry relevant projects in biomedical toxicology and ecotoxicology led by promisingly early career scientists. The prize of € 100 000 has been awarded annually ever since - boosting the careers of twelve younger European scientists in the challenging fields with which LRI is engaged.

For more details on the Cefic-LRI award and how to apply visit the awards web page or email the Cefic-LRI secretariat.

What is LRI?

The Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) programme is a major voluntary initiative of the European chemical industry to support the long-term sustainability of its sector and European society. Through the programme we hope to identify the hazards posed by chemicals and improve the methods available for assessing the associated risks.

The LRI sponsors high-quality research of a standard publishable in a reputable peer-reviewed journal, and seeks to provide sound scientific advice on which industry and regulatory bodies can draw-on to respond quickly and accurately to public concerns.

Register now for 18th Annual LRI Workshop!

The 18th Annual Cefic-LRI Workshop will take place in Brussels from 16-17 November 2016. The event is organised by the Long-Range Research Initiative Programme (LRI) of the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) and it's main focus this year will be on ‘AOPs (Adverse Outcome Pathways) and Genomics: how useful, how to address risk, and where next?’

The event kicks off on the evening of Wednesday 16 November 2016 at the Le Plaza Hotel with an invited poster session and networking cocktail followed by the Workshop Dinner and the 2016 LRI Innovative Science Award ceremony.

This evening session will be chaired by Nicolas Cudre-Mauroux from Solvay Award. He will introduce 2015 LRI award winner Dr Alice Limonciel of Innsbruck Medical University who will present the results of her study to establish thresholds of activation for stress response pathways and ligand-activated receptors for chemical classification.

This will be followed by the presentation of the €100,000 2016 LRI Innovative Science Award to the winning research concept who will outline the work they intend to undertake thanks to the award funding.

On Thursday, 17 November the workshop venue will be The Square in Brussels. This main workshop session will consist of a morning plenary session covering the impact of LRI research in the following key project areas:

• Environmental methodology of mixtures and residues
• Grouping of nanomaterials
• Dust and workers exposure
• Dermal absorption modelling
• Eye irritation alternatives
• Epidemiological evidence of Endocrine Disruption
• Epigenetics normality

After Lunch a thematic panel discussion on ‘AOP and Genomics: how useful, how to address risk, and where next?’ will be chaired and moderated by Prof Ian Kimber of the University of Manchester.

You can download the programme for the event here and registration is now open and free!

Wanted: Ideas for re-using CO2

The Climate-KIC flagship programme EnCO2re (Enabling CO2 re-use) working for sustainable production and circular economy has launched its first open call for proposals to the public. This call is aimed at projects that will begin in September (or earlier) and produce meaningful results within 2016. The selection process is two part, but to take part you need to be quick as the first submission deadline is 27 May.

EnCO2re will add new workstreams in the second half of 2016 and is looking for:

• Projects related to any element of the CO2 value chain, from capture to conversion, and logistics
• Organisations that bring industrial and/or start-up perspectives with pathways to commercialisation
• Technologies and demonstrations for CO2-based products, especially intermediates and polymers
• Business-model innovations that support the development of a CO2 re-use value chain
• Other innovations, including incentives, that advance progress toward large-scale re-use of CO2

Two phase
The call is structured in two phases. The first phase requests a short Expression of Interest using a common template by 27 May.  In the EnCO2re Call profile you can find more details on the call.  You will find some help and guidelines for completing the EoI here.  Successful ideas that meet the call interests and requirements will be invited soon after 10 June to submit a full proposal by 1 July.

Because the programme is an open innovation programme and would like to be as inclusive as possible, all parties interested in joining enCO2re are urged to submit an EoI, even if they do not have a project that can begin in 2016.  All submissions should be emailed to Ted Grozier at Climate-KIC.

About EnCO2re
EnCO2re is an innovation and market development programme for CO2 re-use. Their vision is a balanced and prosperous market for re-used CO2, beginning with a focus on polymers and chemical intermediates. Their ambition is large-scale CO2 re-use through the establishment of a CO2 value chain.

EnCO2re was co-initiated by Climate-KIC and industry partner Covestro, forming a consortium of 12 European partners from industry and research sectors. The programme has a comprehensive approach towards CO2 re-use and comprises activities in technology development, product development, technology acceptance, ecological assessments and market development.

EnCO2re is pronounced like the French word encore, meaning “again,” in reference to the re-use of CO2 the programme aims to enable.

The initial open innovation consortium consists of 12 European partners: Bayer Technology Services, Chalmers University of Technology, Covestro, Imperial College London, Johanneberg Science Park, Engie Labs, Mines ParisTech, RWTH Aachen, TU Berlin, TU Delft, University of Copenhagen and Wuppertal Institut.

Innovation Fusion goes to Barcelona

Cefic and SusChem are contributing as promotional partners for the 12th Annual Innovation Fusion event which is taking place on 19 and 20 April 2016 in Barcelona. ENG’s 12th Annual Innovation Fusion Summit brings together industry experts in research, development and innovation from both the specialty chemical and the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sectors. 

The 2016 edition of Innovation Fusion is designed to allow participants to benefit from the shared knowledge that networking and interactive sessions from a multi-industry perspective can bring.

This year’s event will provide delegates with the tools to handle current and future industry challenges and the inspiration to help connect with market demands. Participants will engage with real business stories, best practices and forums that will address issues including:

• Building and cultivating internal innovation culture 
• Developing strong communication with key stakeholders for alignment throughout the value chain 
• Setting and measuring KPI’s throughout the product portfolio 
• Creating value through incremental and disruptive innovation 

The Innovation Fusion event in Barcelona will allow participants to benchmark their experiences against like-minded peers from complimenting industries. The ENG’s 12th Annual Innovation Fusion: New Product Development (NPD) and Technology Excellence for Chemicals and FMCG Sectors Summit is organised in cooperation with BASF, DSM, Syngenta, Solvay, Barilla, Evonik, Dow and Mars Corporation amongst others.

More information
You can find the full Innovation Fusion 2016 programme here. For more information or to register please contact Joanna Serweta.

Cefic members and SusChem stakeholders can get 20% off the registration fee for the event by using the CEFIC20 promotional code!

To follow the event via twitter follow the ENG Events official twitter account @engfbevents or search for the event hashtag: #enginnovation

Sustainable Circular Economy: New opportunities for raw materials, chemicals and water?

On 15 March Cefic, ERRIN and the East & North Finland region are jointly organising a workshop on ‘The Sustainable Circular Economy – new opportunities for raw materials, chemicals and water?’ in Brussels.

Raw materials, chemicals and water are often regarded as traditional and mature industrial sectors but increased interest in the circular economy linked to Europe’s recently published Circular Economy Strategy has opened up new thinking and new business models based on novel innovative approaches.

What new opportunities are available for these industries and how can regions support innovation and new sectors of competitive industries?

How can regions enhance collaboration within and between the sectors?

How will smart specialisation strategies encourage collaboration between regions?

This workshop will seek to answer some of these questions and explore new opportunities in chemicals, water and raw materials with a focus on regional engagement and interregional collaboration.

More information
The all-day workshop will feature dedicated sessions on EU Policy, Chemicals and Resource Efficiency, Water, and Raw Materials.

The workshop will take place at the Greater Birmingham and West Midlands - Brussels Office on Avenue d'Auderghem in Brussels. More information and a programme for the day can be found here. You can register for the workshop here.

Sustainable Chemistry in Action: A close look at how science can change the world for the better

Science and sustainable chemistry has had an enormous impact on the development of a healthier and more sustainable and prosperous society, yet there is still so much to be done to tackle the world’s most pressing problems such as poverty, hunger, disease and climate change. Every day, scientists across the globe strive to provide answers to these global challenges, going to great lengths and making huge personal sacrifices to develop real solutions.



Dutch chemical and biotechnology company Royal DSM are using the tagline 'Bright Science. Brighter Living' to talk about these challenges and possible solutions. The company is paying tribute to the unsung heroes of our time: the world’s scientists who inspire us by making a positive difference to our society (see the video above).

This campaign aims to start a conversation with the general public, NGOs, governments, businesses and other stakeholders about the importance of science with positive societal purpose. In order to have real societal impact, science should be a truly collaborative effort. Please feel free to share the campaign video that can be found on YouTube  and visiting the dedicated website.

You can also follow DSM on twitter (@DSM) with the campaign hashtag #brightscience, on Facebook, and they have a dedicated YouTube channel too.

Showing the benefits of chlorine chemistry

Euro Chlor, the Brussels-based business association representing chlor-alkali producers in Europe, has just launched a new website featuring the many advantages and benefits of chlorine-based chemistry. The site describes chlorine-based chemistry applications in ten areas of everyday life, from feeding the planet to transportation solutions and home comfort.

Many people know the role of chlorine in disinfecting drinking water and swimming pools, but the wide variety of other uses of chlorine chemistry is relatively unknown. This will change with the new Euro Chlor website.

On the ‘Chlorine Things’ site you can learn how to swim faster than a fish, the way solar cells are produced and how pavements can clean polluted air – all thanks to chlorine chemistry. You can watch videos about how chlorine reacts with metals, and how virtually all communication relies on chlorine chemistry.

The site is also a portal to dialogue with Euro Chlor. The organization is eager to know what its website visitors think about chlorine chemistry. The homepage presents a range of interactive buttons that offer different possibilities for dialogue with the Euro Chlor. Visitors can post links to chlorine-related videos or just ask any chlorine-related question and there is the possibility to win a prize in the process! Click-through links allow visitors to connect with all major chlorine industry websites worldwide.

Why not visit the Chlorine Things website and start a fascinating journey through the chlorine universe!

One Million in Prizes! Ten years of LRI Innovative Science Awards

The recent LRI Annual Workshop in Brussels on 21 November was the occasion to celebrate ten years of the LRI Innovative Science award. The event saw the presentation of this prestigious award for younger scientists to its tenth recipient: Dr. Sabine Langie of VITO. Dr Langie received her prize of € 100 000 from Prof. Ellen Fritsche of the University of Dusseldorf: herself a previous winner and now a member of LRI’s External Scientific Advisory Panel (ESAP).

The Cefic-LRI award programme has been hugely successful over the past decade. The LRI Innovative Science Award was established in 2004 to inspire highly innovative and industry relevant projects in biomedical toxicology and ecotoxicology led by promisingly early career scientists.

The prize of € 100 000 has been awarded annually ever since - boosting the careers of ten younger European scientists in the challenging fields with which LRI is engaged.

This year’s award – making a total of one million euros distributed to research projects under this element of the Cefic-LRI programme so far – was presented by Prof Fritsche (below, left) to Dr Sabine Langie (below, right) of the Flemish Institute for Technological Research (VITO) at the LRI Annual Workshop.

Dr. Langie will use the award to broaden her current work on the analysis of DNA methylation patterns in the saliva of children participating in two significant birth cohort studies in Flanders. She is exploring the hypothesis that prenatal chemical exposures can alter foetal DNA methylation patterns and predispose the child to develop allergic diseases later in life.

The use of saliva is less burdensome for the children in study and easier to collect than, for example, blood samples. The ultimate aim of the study is to develop prevention strategies (including reduction of chemical exposure), particularly in children, and reduce the societal burden associated with allergic diseases.

Career boost
Reviewing the history of the award Prof. Fritsche, who won the award in 2006, described the prize as: “Nitromethane for an Early Career – the LRI award was a big accelerator for my career - a rocket!” This view was echoed by contributions from other awardees over the years.

Dr Roman Ashauer of York University won the award in 2007 and says: “The Cefic-LRI Award allowed me to pursue my own ideas. It was motivation, encouragement and the crucial bit of extra fuel in the tank to push the envelope.”

Similarly Prof Paul van den Brink of Wageningen University, the winner in 2005, commented: “The award gave me the first sense of academic freedom. It was a real push to my career and opened doors for further funding.”

The first ever winner of the award in 2004 Prof Roger Godschalk of Maastricht University is still feeing the effects of the award saying: “With the LRI-award, I was able to put my ideas into practice. It eventually evolved in to my own research line at our institute, which I can continue to build even 10 years after winning the CEFIC LRI-award.”

“Winning this award has been a pivotal factor in my research and professional career. It has allowed me to create my research group, managing my own research budget and having two PhD students working alongside me in the project,” said 2010 winner Dr Maria Saborit of Birmingham University.

Data mining
Delegates to the LRI workshop also got an update on the work of 2012 winner Dr Andreas Bender of the University of Cambridge who is looking to determine biologically relevant effects of compound exposure by chemical, biological and phenotypic data integration.

The in-silico prediction of in-vivo toxicology of a particular compound is a non trivial problem due to the lack of direct correlations between structural features and toxicity. However chemical, protein target and phenotypic data provide complementary bioactivity data and Dr Bender’s work is based on the hypothesis that more accurate toxicity predictions could be made by integrating these data. His core expertise is in data mining and the research has had success in predicting likely protein targets for compounds based on their structure in areas such as mode of action analysis, modelling of bioactivities, natural products and traditional medicines.

The performance of the model algorithm used is increasing all the time and Dr Bender is looking to the ultimate objective of automated prediction of targets given only their chemical structure. These techniques will be useful in future personalised medicine scenarios and he has recently received a € 1.5 million ERC Starter Grant to extend the work towards bioactive mixture modelling.

More information
Details of the next LRI Innovative Science Award will be released in early 2014. The focus of this eleventh competition will be in one of the environmental areas of research covered by LRI. For more details keep an eye on the Cefic-LRI website and to find out more about all previous winners click here.

Additional Cefic-LRI Grants for 2013 Announced

The Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) is a major voluntary initiative of the European chemical industry to support its competitiveness and innovation potential. The LRI programme aims to identify and fill gaps in the understanding of the hazards posed by chemical substances and to improve the methods available for assessing the associated risks. Requests for proposals in a range of research areas were published in June and now two further topics have been published for research commencing in 2014.

LRI sponsors high-quality research, published in peer-reviewed journals, and seeks to provide sound scientific advice on which industry and regulatory bodies can draw to respond more quickly and accurately to society’s concerns.

In addition to the LRI programme for 2013 announced in June, the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) is now accepting further grant applications to carry out research in the following areas:

• LRI-AIMT4: Use of non-animal data to supplement and strengthen read-across
• LRI-C3: Epigenetics - Normality in Toxicologically Relevant Species

Further details of each research area can be found by following the links on each topic.

Applications
The submission deadline for these two extra research areas is 10 January 2014. Project specifications, budget details and application forms can be found on the Cefic LRI website. Only proposals that fit the project specifications and are submitted via the official LRI application form will be considered.

The scientific evaluation and selection of applications for funding are managed by a scientific committee provided by ECETOC. In particular, within LRI, ECETOC has the responsibility of maintaining three “core teams”: health effects, human exposure & risk assessment and environment.

LRI events
Dr. Bruno Hubesch, Cefic-LRI Manager  will be chairing the session on low dose toxicity at the 34th Annual European Meeting of the Toxicology Forum (ToxForum) that takes place on 22 to 24 October in Brussels.

ToxForum aims to be recognised as the leading international toxicological organisation promoting and encouraging dialogue amongst all stakeholders on public health issues.

And don’t forget the 15th Cefic-LRI Annual Workshop that takes place on 20 to 21 November 2013, also in Brussels. The 2013 workshop will discuss how a science-informed approach to decision-making can contribute to relevant policy initiatives. The event will showcase the results and outcomes of several LRI projects completed in 2012-2013. The key areas of discussion will be thresholds of concern, bio-monitoring, domestic exposure, endocrine disrupters, nanomaterials, toxicogenomics and sediment testing.

You can find more information on the workshop here or go straight to registration here.

More information on LRi
For further information, please contact Dr. Bruno Hubesch, Cefic-LRI Manager, or the LRI Secretariat or visit the Cefic-LRI website.

Cefic-LRI Grants 2013 open

The Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) is a major voluntary initiative of the European chemical industry to support its competitiveness and innovation potential. The LRI programme aims to identify and fill gaps in the understanding of the hazards posed by chemical substances and to improve the methods available for assessing any associated risks. The topics in which proposals for research during 2013 are requested have just been announced.

LRI sponsors high-quality research, published in peer-reviewed journals, and seeks to provide sound scientific advice on which industry and regulatory bodies can draw to respond more quickly and accurately to society’s concerns.

In the context of its LRI programme for 2013, the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) is accepting grant applications to carry out research in the following areas:

• LRI-B14: Skin sensitisation - chemical applicability domain of the Local Lymph Node Assay (LLNA)
• LRI-B15: Efficiency of Risk Management Measures (RMM)
• LRI-ECO23: Combining passive sampling and toxicity profiling to assess mixture toxicity of surface waters
• LRI-ECO24: Prediction of Non-Extractable Residues (NER) using structural information 
• LRI-ECO25: Development of soup tests for the risk assessment of NER in soil
• LRI-EMSG58: Quality assessment of the epidemiological evidence of adverse effects to humans of endocrine active substances in the environment
• LRI-N4: Grouping nanomaterials and establishing criteria for Safe by Design
• LRI-S3: Benefits and risk evidence streams for decision makers

Further details of each research area can be found by following the links on each topic.

More information
The deadline for applications is 1 September 2013. Project specifications, budget details and application forms can be found on the Cefic LRI website. Only proposals that fit the project specifications and are submitted via the official LRI application form will be considered.

The scientific evaluation and selection of applications for funding are managed by a scientific committee provided by ECETOC. In particular, within LRI, ECETOC has the responsibility of maintaining three “core teams”: health effects, human exposure & risk assessment and environment.

For further information, please read the complete LRI Requests for Proposals on the Cefic LRI website, or contact Dr. Bruno Hubesch, Cefic-LRI Manager, or the LRI Secretariat.

Industrial Technologies 2012 - Day 1

The SusChem inspired SPIRE (Sustainable Process Industry through Resource and Energy efficiency) PPP was a prominent component of many contributions at the first day of the Industrial Technologies 2012 conference in Aarhus Denmark. The SusChem stand (see below) was complemented by neighbouring booth dedicated to SPIRE and SusChem stakeholders contributed to a number of sessions.

Pierre Joris of Solvay (below) contributed on behalf of SusChem to the morning plenary session on Industry and Horizon2020.

In the afternoon SusChem board member Peter Nagler from Evonik (below) introduced SPIRE and outlined its remit and current status to delegates in the Resource Efficiency session. On 28 June SPIRE will assume a legal identity in Belgium.

Rudolf Strohmeier, deputy director-general of European Commission's DG Research & Innovation was a visitor to both the SusChem and SPIRE stands in the afternoon. He is pictured below (left) at the SPIRE stand with Gernot Klotz of Cefic.

On Wednesday evening the conference Gala Dinner will take place. The highlight of the evening will be a competition to select the Industrial Technologies project with the highest impact. The FP6 project IMPULSE (Integrated Multiscale Process Units with Locally Structured Elements) is one of the ten projects selected for the gala final and it is a SusChem-inspired project.

Project coordinator Mike Matlosz (above) is pictured preparing for a video recording where he explains the project.

The SusChem team is looking forward to Day Two at Aarhus. To keep up to date with SusChem inspired activities at the Industrial Technologies 2012 conference follow SusChem tweets via @suschem.

 

SusChem Stakeholder Event 2012 Announced

Save the date! SusChem has just announced that its 10th Annual Stakeholder Event will take place in Brussels on 17 - 18 April 2012. The event takes the theme 'Partnering for Sustainable Innovation through Chemistry' and will be held at the Diamant Business Centre and Conference Complex on the east side of the city.


As usual, the SusChem stakeholder meeting will be a high profile event and offer participants the latest insights on key topics such as water efficiency, sustainable processes, raw materials, smart cities and other areas where chemistry is playing a central role to develop sustainable solutions for society.

The SusChem event will offer plenty of networking opportunities and provide valuable information on European partnership programmes driven from the Innovation Union and Horizon 2020 objectives.

The 2012 stakeholder event will look to build on the game-changing 2011 event and further engage with value chain partners on concrete priority themes where sustainable chemistry has committed to promote partnerships and inspire innovation to achieve real growth in the EU.

Value chain solutions
No single component in today's complex value chain can deliver the comprehensive and timely solutions that society requires alone: we need to engage the whole value chain and SusChem is looking to deliver this. The 10th SusChem Stakeholder event will be a significant, dynamic, inspiring and productive step towards achieving this. Be there!

The preliminary programme and registration will be available soon via the main SusChem website. In the meantime, if you have any questions on the 2012 SusChem stakeholder event please contact the SusChem secretariat.

And don't forget to follow SusChem news via this blog and also via @suschem on Twitter.

Chemistry for a Better Life at European Parliament

Chemistry takes centre stage at the European Parliament in Brussels tomorrow (November 9) where the European Parliament's Science and Technology Options Assessment Panel (STOA) is holding a workshop on 'Chemistry for a Better Life'.

The workshop will be chaired by Teresa Riera Madurell, MEP and starts at 3pm. The event has been organised by STOA, in cooperation with the European Association for Chemical and Molecular Sciences (EuCheMS) and the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) and aims to highlight the crucial contribution of chemistry to achieving a better quality of life and welfare for humanity. The event takes place within the framework of the IUPAC/ UNESCO International Year of Chemistry 2011.

The workshop will be televised 'live' via a web video link. The main workshop session will be preceeded by a poster exhibition between 12:30 and 14:00.

Speakers at the workshop include:

• Prof. Avelino Corma, Instituto de Technología Química, Valencia
• Prof. Ulrich Schubert, EuCheMS
• Prof. Dr. Dieter Jahn, BASF
• Prof. Dr. Nicola Armaroli, CNR Bologna
• Richard Allan, Scottish Water Horizons
• Prof. Luis A. Oro, EuCheMS

Chemistry for solutions
Chemistry is fully committed to developing sustainable solutions to Europe’s pressing problems, including fostering resource efficiency (such as the proposed SPIRE PPP), developing alternative energy portfolios, redressing the consequences of climate change, improving our health conditions and assuring an adequate food supply for a growing population.

Chemistry is central to progress in many scientific and technological fields. Working with a wide range of experts EuCheMS has published a Roadmap where a number of key areas have been identified in which advances in chemistry can tackle some of the ‘Grand Challenges’ underlined by the Lund Declaration of 2009.

Chemistry, both as an industry and a science, will play a pivotal role in ensuring that the European Union is able to realise its vision of an ‘Innovation Union'. A strong partnership between academic, research and industry will ensure that research is transferred to sustainable economic solutions that contribute to the improved welfare of our society.

The workshop will be opened by a key note speech from Prof. Avelino Corma, Instituto de Technología Química, Valencia, followed by three Panel Sessions. Discussions between the panel members, MEPs and participants will provide an open discussion on the role of and expectations for chemistry in the forthcoming European Commission Common Strategic Framework for Research & Innovation - aka Horizon 2020.

Wetsus talks sustainable water technology

The 7th annual Wetsus congress will be held in the northern Dutch city of Leeuwarden on October 3 and 4. The theme for this year’s congress is ‘Cooperation in innovation, a global requirement?’

The congress is split into two halves with the first day covering international cooperation initiatives on water technology including the involvement of public-private partnerships. In the afternoon, parallel sessions cover the major challenges for water and how educational and human resource issues interface with water issues.

The second day is devoted to developments in water science and technology, again in parallel sessions, including the structure of water, invisible threats to water supply, safety of non-piped systems, water reuse, agricultural water treatment, getting value from waste water, desalination and energy from water.

Registration for the first day of the congress is free, but a €175 fee (free for students) is charged for the October 4 sessions.

Centre of excellence
Wetsus is a centre of excellence for sustainable water technology. It creates a unique environment and strategic cooperation for development of profitable and sustainable state of the art water treatment technology. This multidisciplinary collaboration between some 70 companies and 13 research institutes in Wetsus results in innovations that contribute significantly to the solution of global water problems.

More information on registration and programme content can be found on the Wetsus website.

REACH and Innovation

As part of its extensive review of the REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals) Regulations the European Union has commissioned a new survey to assess the impact of the regulations on launched the innovativeness of the chemical industry in Europe.

The survey, which will be open for input until 7 October 2011, is being conducted by the Centre for Strategy and Evaluation Services (CSES) on behalf of the European Commission DG Enterprise and Industry.

This innovation survey forms part of a wider exercise to evaluate the effects of REACH and to inform future amendments to the legislation.

Chemical stakeholders
The online survey of businesses across the European Union will receive feedback on key issues related to the implementation of the REACH Regulation. The survey targets manufacturers and importers of chemical substances but also downstream users, distributors of chemicals and other firms involved in the different stages of the chemicals supply chain that may be affected by the REACH Regulation and is available in all European languages.

Views are solicited on innovation from product conception through testing and piloting to production. Within the interpretation of the term “innovation” is included product, process, marketing and organisational innovation.

For more information on the purpose of the study, please contact Jan Smits, REACH evaluation project leader at CSES. The survey can be found here.

World Chemistry Congress kicks off in Puerto Rico

Academics and business leaders have come to Puerto Rico to attend three significant International Year of Chemistry 2011 events. The 43rd World Chemistry Congress, the 46th IUPAC (International Union of Pure & Applied Chemistry) General Assembly and the World Chemistry Leadership Meeting take place in San Juan, Puerto Rico from today (July 31) to August 7.

The 43rd World Chemistry Congress has the theme "Chemistry Bridging Innovation Between the Americas and the World” and will be a major event for the development of chemistry and related scientific and technological disciplines. The Congress includes plenary lectures, symposia, oral presentations, poster presentations, workshops, group meetings and an up-to-date scientific exhibition. Seven chemistry Nobel laureates will be joining the event as plenary speakers.

The World Chemistry Leadership Meeting will be held during the IUPAC 2011 General Assembly. A full-day event is planned for August 2 and Cefic President Giorgio Squinzi will give a keynote address at this event. The meeting will aim to identify new ways to accelerate the contributions of chemistry to Sustainable Development through innovative international collaboration between involving scientists from chemistry and the chemical related sciences, policy makers and social actors, including those with global responsibilities from the relevant UN agencies, and those who apply the science and who will develop the key technologies for tomorrow from industry. It will be a perfect opportunity for leaders from chemistry to set new priorities for the science.

Gernot Klotz of Cefic and SusChem will present at a session on employment and professional development for chemists. He will present the recent Cefic work on skills needs to improve innovation in the chemical industry.

Cefic Responsible Care Awards 2011

The closing date for entries to the Cefic Responsible Care Awards 2011 is fast approaching. The final date for reciept of entries is 24 June.

The awards are open to companies to showcase their projects or achievements under Responsible Care - the chemical industry's commitement to sustainability - and share their effective and innovative approaches. In celebration of the International Year of Chemistry 2011, a Special Award is dedicated to outstanding community outreach projects. Business federations are eligible to receive this Special Award.

High recognition
The Awards will be presented by the Cefic President during the Global Chemical Industry European Convention in Madrid on 30 September 2011. Winners will be invited to attend the event and receive their Awards. Award winners will feature in a Cefic film that is widely used by Cefic at conferences, on YouTube and on the Cefic website. You can watch the 2010 Award winners film here! All entries commended by the independent jury will be published in Cefic’s Annual Report on Responsible Care and on the Cefic website.

Easy to apply
Just fill in the application form on the Cefic website, submit a short project summary on one page and add any further documentation available. For more information read the application form or contact Bernhard Thier, Manager Responsible Care at Cefic.