This study discusses the relationship between Green Chemistry and Environmental Sustainability as expressed in textbooks and articles on Green Chemistry authored by their promoters. It was found that although the Brundtland concept of Sustainable Development/Sustainability has been mentioned often by green chemists, a full analysis of that relationship was almost never attempted. In particular, green chemists have paid scarce attention to the importance of The Second Law of thermodynamics on Environmental Sustainability and the consequences of the limitations it imposes on (...) Green Chemistry, which are discussed in this paper. (shrink)

This article provides an overview of the origins and development of green chemistry. Aiming to contribute to the understanding of green chemistry, basically from a historical point of view, this overview argues that contextual influences and the user friendliness of the term are drivers for the explosive growth of green chemistry. It is observed that political support for its development has been significant, in which the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990 was a formal political starting-point, but informally the origins of (...) green chemistry go back to before 1990. US EPA played an important role in all this, but did not solely contribute to the growth of green chemistry. (shrink)

During large parts of its history chemistry was seen as a science of progress, admired by many. But contemporary public debates on chemistry have been quite critical, mainly for environmental reasons. Therefore is it interesting to note that in the course of the 1990s “green chemistry” emerged. The origins, scientific meaning and drivers behind the spectacular growth of that new field are the subject of Research between Science, Society and Politics: The History and Scientific Development of Green Chemistry. The scientific (...) character of green chemistry has been a matter of dispute since its inception. This book aims to clarify that dispute. It presents a historical analysis of its birth and evolution, with a special focus on the USA, the UK and the Netherlands and the chemical societies in these countries. The emergence of green chemistry differed from one country to another, which is analyzed and compared as well. Based on quantitative and qualitive research methods and a wide range of primary sources never studied before, this book ultimately offers a new characterization of “green chemistry”. It should be of interest to chemists, policy makers and historians & philosophers of chemistry, because Research between Science, Society and Politics accounts for both internal scientific as well as socio-cultural factors that played a role during the emergence and growth of green chemistry. (shrink)

A new chronology is introduced to address the history of chemistry, with educational purposes, particularly for the end of the twentieth century and here identified as the fifth chemical revolution. Each revolution are considered in terms of the Kuhnian notion of ‘exemplar,’ rather than ‘paradigm.’ This approach enables the incorporation of instruments, as well as concepts and the rise of new subdisciplines into the revolutionary process and provides a more adequate representation of such periods of development and consolidation. The fifth (...) revolution developed from 1973 to 1999 and is characterized by a deep transformation in the very heart of chemistry. That is to say, the size and type of objects, the way in which they must be done and the time in which they are transformed. In one way or another, chemistry’ limits had been set out. (shrink)