Environmental Sustainability

Lee Durndell

Dr Lee Durndell, Lecturer in Chemistry at the University of Plymouth will deliver a talk on ‘Nature-inspired solutions to sustainable chemical, fuel and energy production from waste and biomass.’ 

Lee’s talk looks to highlight the current (and future) innovations surrounding the control of active sites and functionalities in materials design, as a viable route to sustainable, yet high-efficiency chemical and energy production processes from waste. Taking inspiration from enzymes, heralded as nature’s “great chemical machines,” we will show how recent innovations in our molecular toolkit have created new, unrealised pathways into the control of chemical transformations at the atomic scale.

Benefits to industry: A deeper understanding of functionalised nanomaterials, and their application to waste chemical transformations, provides significant enhancements in chemical manufacturing processes, by reducing energy consumption and waste. The discussed results and practices provide key empirical data on materials design, process performance allowing for accurate disentangling of complex chemical and engineering phenomena, and facile routes to high throughput chemical generation from waste. 

Adoption of these practices is key to ensuring a sustainable chemical industry, and addressing Net Carbon Zero targets, within the manufacturing sector.