GREEN CHEMISTRY – A NEW DRIVER FOR BUSINESS GROWTH

“GREEN CHEMISTRY – A NEW DRIVER FOR BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT” –  was the title of a webinar held on 24 April, and organized on 24 April 2024 by the RECP Centre in Ukraine in collaboration with the Center for Green Chemistry & Green Engineering at Yale University under GEF-funded UNIDO project “The Global GreenChem Innovation and Network Program”. 

Over 50 participants joined the online event and showed high interest and activity during the meeting, especially in the interactive Q&A session.

The webinar focused on the current state of green chemistry and its main application areas, including new synthesis routes, the replacement of traditional petroleum-based solvents with bio-solvents and the increased use of renewable raw materials for basic chemicals. The speaker explained the green chemicals market and the trends most influencing its growth. Among green chemicals, bio-alcohols account for the largest share of 45%, while bio-organic acids, biopolymers, bio-ketones, biosolvents, etc. are also available. Production and consumption of biopolymers from renewable resources are the fastest growing. The main drivers of the green chemicals market are the economic viability of implementing green chemicals solutions and the growing environmental awareness of consumers and demand for green products. The green chemicals market is clearly becoming more attractive to investors and its growth rate is significantly higher than that of the traditional chemicals sector. The speaker showcased real-life examples of green chemistry applications in various industries.

In addition, the obstacles to the spread of the concept of Green Chemistry were discussed. In particular, the webinar participants believe (based on the proposed survey) that the most important reasons hindering the development of green chemistry among Ukrainian companies are legislative and bureaucratic barriers, as well as the competition between economic growth and environmental protection. Less significant barriers, according to the participants, are the potentially lower efficiency of green chemistry products compared to traditional goods and the higher cost of green products.

Stay tuned for further activities of the Global Green Chemistry Innovation and Networking Programme (GreenChem), our website and the RECP Centre’s social media.

You can find a video recording of the webinar on the RECPC YouTube channel here.

Organizers
The event is organized by the RECP Centre in Ukraine in collaboration with the Center for Green Chemistry & Green Engineering at Yale University under GEF-funded UNIDO project “The Global GreenChem Innovation and Network Programme”.