Sustainability in chemical engineering education: Identifying a core body of knowledge (original) (raw)

The quality of modern life depends on the availability of vast amounts of energy and an array of products provided by the chemical industry. Chemical processes provide products and materials used in health care, consumer products, transportation, agriculture, food processing, electronic materials, and construction. Highly energetic, globally transportable fuels are an essential element of global transportation and distribution systems. Yet, these same chemical processes and fuel systems that provide products essential for modern economies, like all engineered systems, consume resources and have environmental impacts. Growing demand for energy, food and materials have put increasing pressure on air and water, arable land, and raw materials. Concern over the ability of natural resources and environmental systems to support the needs and wants of global populations, now and in the future, is part of an emerging awareness of the concept of sustainability. Sustainability is a powerful, yet abstract, concept. The most commonly employed definition of sustainability is that of the Brundtland Commission report-development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs (1). However, a search on the definition of sustainability will return many variations on this basic concept. For example, the 2006 National Research Council report on Sustainability in the Chemical Industry (2) defines sustainability as "a path forward that allows humanity to meet current environmental and human health, economic, and societal needs without compromising the progress and success of future generations". In engineering, incorporating a concern about sustainability into products, processes, technology systems, and services generally means integrating environmental, economic, and social factors in the evaluation of projects and designs. This can be referred to as "sustainable engineering", but other terms have also been used; green engineering, design for environment, pollution prevention, eco-efficiency and a variety of other terms. To grasp the magnitude of the sustainability challenge, it is useful to invoke a conceptual equation that is generally attributed to Ehrlich and Holdren (3). The equation relates impact (I), to population (P), affluence (A), and technology (T). I = P * A * T This conceptual relationship, commonly referred to as the IPAT equation, suggests that impacts, which could be energy use, materials use, or emissions, are the product of the population (number of people), the affluence of the population (generally expressed as gross domestic product of a nation or region, divided by the number of people in the nation or region), and the Perspective AIChE Journal