How Chemical Engineers Are Helping Save the Environment

It's long been known that the world is facing some very serious environmental challenges. Climate change, pollution, and dwindling natural resources are problems that are only going to get worse if they aren't meaningfully addressed. Scientists have expressed major worries about how long the earth will remain habitable under the current conditions, not to mention the strife and conflict likely to be caused by shortages of food and potable water.

Fortunately, the outlook for the planet is not all gloom and doom. Scientists from a wide number of disciplines are working to meet the challenges posed by our world's environmental issues. In particular, chemical engineers the world over are doing their part to help secure a viable future for the next generation.

What Chemical Engineers Do

What do chemical engineers do? The short answer is a lot. Chemical engineering has advanced a countless number of modern technologies, from computer chips and energy production to recycling and even medicine. Chemical engineering is part of almost every aspect of our lives: biotechnology, petrochemicals, food processing, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, and more.

No small number of them have chosen to focus on environmental issues, using their skills in mathematics and science to address environmental challenges from an engineering and technical perspective. When it comes to the environment, many chemical engineers choose to focus specifically on things like pollution control and remediation — but there's a wide array of projects chemical engineers are undertaking right now that tackle large-scale environmental and ecological problems.

How Chemical Engineers Are Helping Save the Environment

Eliminating the need for fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are polluting, non-renewable, and often difficult to collect. Our reliance on fossil fuels goes far beyond our energy and transportation needs — they also form the backbone of some of our biggest industries, like plastics. To make it worse, 70% of the material goods created with fossil fuels end up in landfills. Chemical engineers are working on finding, developing, and promoting new, more sustainable ways of meeting our energy needs.

Carbon capture. One of the ways chemical engineers are trying to help reduce CO2 emissions is with carbon capture. Carbon capture is the practice of reducing carbon dioxide leaked into the atmosphere (and contributing to climate change) by capturing it before it's released into that atmosphere. This process injects the carbon dioxide back underneath the earth, where it could potentially be retrieved again as fossil fuel.

Green energy. One of the most common goals of environmental science in general is to find eco-friendly, sustainable, "green" energy to meet our needs now and in the future. Alternative fuels like ethanol and biodiesel are already starting to supplement traditional fossil fuels, and electric vehicles are steadily growing in popularity. More sustainable energy solutions like wind farms, hydroelectric power, and solar energy are also likely to become more widely adopted to reduce our need for non-renewable energy sources.

Food supply. Food production and supply is going to become a major issue as the climate continues to change. Humanity is dependent on agriculture on a massive scale to survive, and the amount of food waste and chemical / material by-products used up by food production are both serious issues. Chemical engineers are working toward limiting or eliminating that food waste, recovering valuable resources from food waste and by-products, and developing new products with a better shelf life.

Water access and purification. Water is the most basic building block of life, and access to clean, drinkable, usable water is only going to become a more serious issue as the climate continues to shift and once-reliable sources of clean water diminish or disappear. Chemical engineers are working in this field to remove pollutants from wastewater and reuse water that would otherwise be hopelessly contaminated — ensuring that the world has enough clean water for everyone.

What We've Achieved

Chemical engineering isn't just about theoretical futures when it comes to the environment. There are major achievements in chemical engineering that have already made our lives (and the environment) a little better:

• Carbon capture from the air is already underway in places across the globe, helping work toward the goal of achieving carbon neutrality.

• Many companies are reducing their use of plastics by developing new products, such as Coca-Cola creating a new plant-based bottle to replace the more traditional plastic bottles.

• There's an increasing shift toward embracing more green and sustainable building methods to slow the depletion of non-renewable or difficult to replace natural resources.

We've come a long way in deploying science to help combat the environmental challenges facing the world — but there remains a great deal of work to be done. Chemical engineers are in higher demand than ever before, and smart, qualified, degree-holding engineers — both present and aspiring — have a lucrative and rewarding career ahead.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or the management of EconoTimes