July 2016 VLS Webinar

This month, the VLS welcomes Dr. David Constable, who give us a behind-thescenes tour to the transformational initiative described on the website www.altsep.org. Rooted in a collaborative partnership between the American Chemical Society Green Chemistry Institute® (ACS GCI) and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), thisinitiative aims to fundamentally change the way we apply separation technologies in chemical manufacturing. Distillation is a well-understood, reliable predictable separation process that works. Recognizing that distillation at the heart of most chemical processes accounts for over 35% of the energy used in U.S. chemical manufacturing, ACS GCI and AIChE have joined forces to work with innovators across the separation process value chain to find ways to jump start the industrial application of less energy-intensive separation processes. The first step in this journey is the creation of an innovation roadmap for advancing the rational design and predictable, widespread, industrial application of sustainable separation processes. The collaboratively developed roadmap will identify and prioritize research, development, and demonstration needs targeted at technology initiatives with the potential to transform the competitiveness and sustainability of the U.S. chemical enterprise. The success of this initiative relies on the collective wisdom and effort of chemists and

chemical engineers working together to pave the way for a next generation chemical manufacturing with sustainable separation processes at the core.

 

The Speaker: As Director of the American Chemical Society’s Green Chemistry Institute®, Dr. Constable works to catalyze and enable the implementation of green chemistry and engineering throughout the global chemistry enterprise. From the end of September, 2011 until January, 2013 David worked as the owner and principal at Sustainability Foresights, LLC, a consultancy directed toward assisting companies with Sustainability, Sustainable and Green Chemistry, Energy, Environment, Health and Safety programs. David left Lockheed Martin as the Corporate Vice President of Energy, Environment, Safety & Health (ESH) at the end of September 2011. Prior to joining Lockheed Martin, David was the Director of Operational Sustainability in the Corporate Environment, Health, and Safety Department at GlaxoSmithKline. In that global role, he championed Environment, Health and Safety support for New Product Development and Supply. He also led GlaxoSmithKline’s development of programs, systems, tools, and methodologies that integrated sustainability, life cycle inventory assessment, green chemistry, and green

technology activities into existing business processes. Prior to joining SmithKline Beecham, he served as a Group Leader in the SHEA Analytical Services group of ICI Americas.