The Green chemistry It is synonymous with health and environmental sustainability. Basically, green or organic chemistry is aimed at looking for new Ways to synthesize chemical substances to achieve a more friendly chemistry with health and environment. His reason for being, the purpose pursued with green chemistry, -also called sustainable or organic chemistry -is to find alternatives to those proposals for traditional chemistry, which on so many occasions represents a danger to health and also for the environment.
The simple fact of considering the possible impact that a new substance may imply, either at the environmental or human level- is a key difference with respect to conventional chemistry. In this type of chemistry, from the same phase of design and development of the new substances, the potential impact represented by traditional formulas to offer healthier and/or sustainable alternatives is taken into account.
Next, in Ecology Verde we explain to you What is green chemistry, its definition, principles and examples.
Environmental Compatibility of Green Chemistry
The alternatives seek to eliminate those harmful effects or, at least, minimize them, so that their contribution opens a window to hope, in this world, colonized by chemistry as a pollutative agent that also threatens the health of people from the most everyday places and at the same time unsuspected.
As Kenneth Doxsee, a researcher at the University of Oregon, explains in the United States, organic chemistry helps Prevent pollution Thanks to scientific solutions that have endless applications.
By offering alternatives of greater environmental compatibility, compared to the products or processes currently available whose danger is greater and that are used by both the consumer and in industrial applications, green chemistry promotes pollution prevention at the molecular level.
The concept of green or sustainable chemistry He discovers a much more kind side of chemistry, especially, thanks to his revolutionary approach, which helps Save resources And also to preserve them, to obtain benefits of it that allow us to lead a healthier life in a healthier environment, – more use of water and energy, to the reduction of the environmental impact of chemicals once used and making productive processes more sustainable – and, among other sectors, it can also transform the pharmaceutical industry.
Although there is still much to advance, there is a growing commitment on the part of scientists, investors and institutions to help their development. Green Chemistry Institute stands out, whose objective is to promote the use of green chemistry for a more sustainable world and also a protector of human health by resorting to this new concept of organic chemistry.
The 12 principles of green chemistry
The Principles of green or sustainable chemistry They were formulated by Paul Anasta and John Warner in his book “Green Chemistry: Theory and Practice”, and are the following:
- Avoid waste will always be better than having to treat them or eliminate them later.
- The finished product in synthesis designs must incorporate the maximum possible materials used during the process.
- Minimize toxicity in the design of synthetic methods should be a priority. Ideally it must not have any, and in practice it must always be minimized as much as possible.
- Preserving efficacy has been compatible with reducing or eliminating toxicity.
- Minimum use of auxiliary substances (solvents, adsorbents, etc.), always opting for the most innocuous.
- Apply processes to pressure and ambient temperature with preference to achieve energy efficiency.
- Renewable materials will always be priority.
- Avoid derivations when possible, such as locking groups or, for example, protection and lack of protection.
- Replace stoichiometric reagents with catalytic reagents provided it can.
- Design products so that they are biodegradable.
- Monitor the process to prevent dangerous substances from forming.
- Reduce the risk of accident also by selecting processes and substances.
Examples of green or sustainable chemistry
These are some Examples of sustainable or green chemistry that they can clarify this concept and that today are already applied in day to day in various manufacturing processes and in the final products themselves:
- Green extinguishers: They use biodegradable surfactants that serve to create fire extinguishing foams.
- Polyactic acid: It is another sustainable component used in green chemistry to design biodegradable materials of types types.
- Products to reduce lead: Biofuels, catalysts in cars and no lead gasoline, etc.
- Supercritical CO2: Mixed with a moisturizer is perfect for eliminating tissue fat, used in dry cleaners as a substitute for perclorethylene that is harmful. If it is mixed with acetic acid and water, it is a good sustainable product to achieve the sterilization of materials at low temperatures.
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