Greening Chemistry is a series of opinion columns, written by a rotating group of contributors.
There is a common perception that chemistry labs are full of danger: fires, explosions, flashes of light, and caustic solutions. Those flourishes are found in the new Frankenstein film and in programs like the Powerpuff Girls, who were conceived with an explosion that is presented comedically. Obviously, Professor Utonium shouldn’t have been doing chemistry in his basement. But perhaps using safer, greener chemicals could also have lowered the risk of the incident that nearly cost him his life.
As skewed as popular perception is, as chemists we can and should be very deliberate about reducing the risks to ourselves in the lab and to those outside it. This is where green chemistry comes in.
Greener practices in the lab help improve lab safety. Deliberating about these issues thoughtfully throughout the life cycle of an experiment, from planning to conclusion, can deliver important benefits. In a lab, the risk of an accident is associated with both the level of hazard and the likelihood of exposure. For an analogy, let’s say you decide to go hiking. Most hikes are a low-risk activity and a great way to get moving in some fresh air. But there is risk. You could twist an ankle, get lost, or come across some not-so-friendly wilderness inhabitants. You can bring a medical kit, maps, and compasses, but the risks can fluctuate, depending on which path is taken, the time of day, and even what you wear. That kind of variation in risk also appears when choosing a chemical synthesis. We use unsafe reagents and materials, including carcinogenic, reprotoxic, flammable, or even explosive compounds. Green chemistry gives us the opportunity to arrive at our goal while minimizing the hazards along the way.
Our personal protective equipment (PPE) can help prevent problems from spiraling out of control, but it is meant to be seen as a last line of defense rather than as a primary safeguard. If PPE fails, we may be vulnerable to the chemicals used and the hazards they bring. This is when doing chemistry can compromise the safety of human beings. On a larger scale, these events can imperil the environment, become big news on your TV, and increase negative public perception of the field. Green chemistry, however, tries to solve this problem at the very molecular level: by using less hazardous substances in the design stage of our processes and products, the risk of something going wrong is lowered even if accidental exposure occurs.
Protecting ourselves and others requires a full analysis of and a safety-centered approach not only to the spaces we work in and the tools we use but to the reagents we pack in our chemical toolboxes. In the laboratory, chemists often seek to tackle new chemical technologies or complete exciting but difficult transformations. In this pursuit of new chemical space, we tend to set aside some of the outputs or by-products of the development process.
We sometimes delay addressing important considerations such as the ease of operation, the safety of the system, or the overall run time. Take catalytic reactions, for example. Many of the advancements in catalysis have focused on lowering catalyst loading and increasing catalyst activity rather than on removing metals or the recycling angle. While these new approaches help from a green perspective by reducing the amount of metal and reagents to manage, they don’t help boost the safety of the system if the reaction requires overnight refluxes, complicated purifications, or wasteful ligand preparations. We should be increasing the ease of operation of reactions, streamlining the isolation processes, and using safer reagents to lower the concerns around doing chemistry. We need to show the scientific community that chemistry can be safe and still be exciting and productive. Through sharing safer practices and informing people of those greener outcomes, we can help make chemistry more approachable. This, in turn, helps make chemistry more enticing to younger generations.
By making all types of chemistry greener from initial sourcing through synthesis to end-of-life, we can also make it easier for consumers to feel better about their role in the greening of chemistry. Making changes in the lab also helps prevent environmental fouling and minimizes the runoff that often plagues disadvantaged communities more than well-off ones. It can be a strong first step in the right direction—one that many manufacturers are recognizing. Our academic colleagues are starting to turn the corner but still need a gentle nudge.
In addition to considering time and education as key components of greener science, bringing a circular consideration to our chemistry, from source to disposal, is deeply connected to the safety of the environments we create and cultivate.
Portrait shot of Isaiah Speight, who wears a beard and a black shirt.
Isaiah Speight
Credit:
Courtesy of Isaiah Speight
Through implementing the principles of green chemistry we can improve the safety of our chemical processes in a multifaceted manner. No one principle can stand true without the other. We can attempt to eliminate risk as much as possible, but some inevitably remains. This is why the use of green chemistry is so valuable: it helps reduce that creeping fear. Managers will feel more comfortable with their lab members handling resources, professors can rest easier about their students being in the lab, communities can feel better about their members who work in laboratory settings, and society can rely on scientists to use appropriate care to protect our environment and people. This all starts with thinking green.
Isaiah Speight is an assistant professor at William and Mary and a principal investigator at the National Science Foundation’s Center for the Mechanical Control of Chemistry.
Portrait shot of Juliana Vidal, who is outside and wears a flowered top and a black sweater.
Juliana Vidal
Credit:
Courtesy of Juliana Vidal
Juliana Vidal is a senior program manager at Beyond Benign, a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering the community for a sustainable future through green chemistry.
Views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of C&EN or the American Chemical Society.
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