Environmental impact of chemical processes

Invent new algorithms to globally optimize at the worldwide level the use of raw materials, energy, and environmental impact of chemical processes. 

Two useful measures of the potential environmental impact of chemical processes are the F-factor, defined as the mass ratio of waste to desired product, and the... 

Three important economic drivers can also bring significant potential benefits for the environmental impact of chemical processes ... 

Chemical Producers Association [26]. Other related policies such as a drive towards improved safety and sustainability of industry [27], and a reduction of the environmental impact of chemical processing contribute to this concept [28],... 

To assess the environmental impact of chemical processes, EATOS can take into consideration up to ten different substances ecotoxicological and human toxicological parameters, and each parameter can be given a different weight. Such substances parameters are then normalized (each parameter is made to vary from 1 to 10) and then combined to afford an environmental quotient (El) (much the same as Sheldon s Q). Thus, each different component of the waste can be assigned a quantitative potential environmental impact PEIout (much the same of Sheldon s environmental quotient EQ), defined as the product of its mass (relative to the product unit mass) with its El. 

Optimization is essential for reducing material and energy requirements as well as the harmful environmental impact of chemical processes. It leads to better design and operation of chemical processes as well as to sustainable processes. Many applications of optimization involve several objectives, some of which are conflicting. Multi-objective optimization (MOO) is required to solve the resulting problems in these applications. Hence MOO has attracted the attention of several researchers, particularly in the last ten years. 

Much work has been done in recent years around the environmental impact of chemical processes. The question is, How do we measure the environmental impact of a process Almost simultaneously, in the early 1990s, Professors Barry Trost and Roger Sheldon came up with proposals for doing this. 

Green Chemistry and Quantifying the Environmental Impact of Chemical Processes... 

The future will bring further increase in concern over the environmental impact of chemical operations. The liquid effluents must not only be controlled, they must also be rendered harmless to the environment. This requires removal of the hazardous substances. For many of the dilute waste solutions, solvent extraction has proved to be an effective process. This is even more true for recycling of mixed metals from various industries. Nevertheless, the increasing amounts of wastes from human activities require much more to be done in this field. 

To overcome such a drawback, that is, the formation and disposal of enormous amounts of liquid effluents (their Chemical Oxygen Demand being about 20 kg/m3) and solid by-products (i.e., about 0.15 kg of dried mycelium and 2 kg of CaS04.2H20 per kg of monohydrated citric acid), several process alternatives have been so far suggested to minimize the overall environmental impact of this process (Moresi and Parente, 1999). 

R D has an obvious and important role to play in any EMS, especially since competence in understanding the environmental impact of chemicals and processing is a high level requirement. 

Tocopherols and tocotrienols used for supplementation of foods and feeds or production of nutraceuticals, e.g., pills and powders, are obtained either by extraction from natural sources or by chemical synthesis (Schuler, 1990 O Leary, 1993). Extraction of tocopherols and tocotrienols from natural sources is economically feasible only if tocopherol/tocotrienol-rich raw materials are available at large quantities and are of high quality. In production of both natural and synthetic compounds, there are several extraction and purification processes that have to be optimized and controlled. Moreover, the environmental impacts of these processes should be acknowledged. Technological innovations in these areas are constantly needed. 

Clean technology is also about reducing the hazard and the risk both to people and the environment this brings in concepts such as inherently safe design of reactions and substitution of hazardous chemicals or those that pose a high risk. In short green chemistry is about reducing the environmental impact of both processes and products. 

E. List any recommendations for improving the health, safety or environmental impact of this process or chemical in the future. 

When the environmental impacts of a process are compared with the capacity of the environment or with the impacts of other processes from different production sectors, the role of the process scale lies at the center of the discussion. For instance, in a study for the production of fine chemicals it has been demonstrated that the respective environmental impacts per kilogram of product can be more than two orders of magnitudes higher than those of bulk chemicals [63] however, bulk chemical production volumes can be more than four orders of magnitude higher. Another example refers to the utilization of biomass for replacing fossil-based production of chemicals and fuels. In this case it should be kept in mind that, currently, less than 10% of fossil-based production is... 

Process design engineers should be concerned not only about the enviroiunental impacts that are directly generated in the designed process, but also consider the environmental impacts that are associated with the provision of the raw materials and services they specify as inputs to their processes. In recent years, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has been given a lot of attention as an environmental indicator of chemical processes [24], LCA is a comprehensive technique that covers both upstream and downstream effects of the activity or product under examination, thus often being referred to as cradle-to-grave analysis [25]. 

Even at high throughput capacities, the process is compact. The environmental impact of a process installation is thus minimized and the process can be fitted into limited space locations such as existing chemical sites or an ocean-going barge... 

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