Designing Sustainable Processes

Recognizing the benefits of sustainable engineering design is growing, and it is driving a global, industry-wide implementation of sustainable processes/targets. In fact, incorporating a sustainable strategies  (i.e. manufacturing, supply chain, etc) is important to stay competitive, and its impact is expected to grow. Scientific innovation and intentionally incorporating sustainability criteria as one of the goals for process development can enable sustainability to go hand-in-hand with profitability. 

The speakers in this session will address multiple facets of sustainable process development, including: (1) What are the key criteria for developing a sustainable process? (2) How do we translate a broad sustainable goal(s) into quantifiable metrics and incorporate them in each step of process development? (3) What are key challenges that may delay or prevent the development or implementation of sustainable processes? And (4) What can we do to minimize, or overcome those challenges?

Session Chairs:

• Kil Ho Lee, Dow
• Yamini Krishnan, Corteva

Tentative Schedule:

Abstracts:

Sustainability Metrics for Small Molecule Development

Abraham Schuitman, Corteva Agriscience

Abstract Pending

Engineering Sustainable Processes in the Pharmaceutical Industry: Tools and Case Studies

Benjamin Cohen, Bristol Myers Squibb; Chris Wilbert, Bristol Myers Squibb; Patrick Sipple, Bristol Myers Squibb; Geoff Purdum, Bristol Myers Squibb

The implementation of sustainable manufacturing processes is an area of significant focus in the pharmaceutical industry. The manufacturing of small molecule active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) creates significant quantities of waste, including wastewater, solvents, used resins, excess reagents, and spent catalysts. The introduction of Green Chemistry Principles has provided a framework for development groups to reduce the environmental footprint of their processes. At BMS, more sustainable processes are achieved through strategic decisions on synthetic routes, process design, and unit operation optimization on the project level. Furthermore, the utilization of tools that guide, contextualize, and measure the impacts of process development decisions are essential to awareness and application of Green Chemistry Principles in the BMS portfolio. This presentation will describe the role of chemistry and engineering development in the optimization of a clinical API manufacturing process that resulted in >90% reduction in waste generated. Additionally, the introduction of tools that integrate sustainability metrics directly into existing workflows, designed by engineers at BMS, will be discussed.

Sustainable Design Principals for a Circular Economy

Santiago Faucher, Ecomaterials Inc

Designing for sustainability requires the selection of sustainable raw materials and process routes. But what defines sustainability? How can we from the onset select an approach that will achieve the desired goal of creating sustainable processes and materials? In the past, and perhaps even today, our approach has been to rely on what was “perceived” by Society to be “green”. For example, at the beginning of this millennium bio-based materials were thought to be synonymous with “green” materials. Yet we discovered at that time, through the implementation of life cycle analyses, that what is bio-based does not necessarily equate to a “green” material. To the dismay of many who had developed bio-based materials thought to be green, we in fact discovered that those same materials had a higher carbon footprint than their conventionally derived peers. This was in part due to the heavy pre-processing required to obtain the desired building blocks from bio-based feedstocks. While life cycle analysis provides some means of measuring the lifecycle impact of a material, the databases on which this method estimates these impacts are limited in comparison to the library of raw materials and process steps available to the chemist/chemical engineer. Overwhelmed by the effort required to complete a life cycle analysis, the process designer often reverts to perception rather than metrics to make choices in their process routes and materials; this is a haphazard way of developing sustainable processes and materials. There is however a better way, we can extract the principals from life-cycle-analysis and economics and apply them to making educated choices in raw materials and process routes. In this talk, these principles will be developed and presented to help the designer succeed more quickly and effectively towards improved sustainability and a circular economy.