ACS Award for Affordable Green Chemistry

Purpose

To recognize outstanding scientific discoveries that lay the foundation for environmentally-friendly products or manufacturing processes at a cost comparable to or less than that of current technologies, or discoveries that deliver new applications with compelling cost/benefit profiles. To identify and recognize discovery of new eco-friendly chemistries with the potential to enable products or manufacturing processes that are less expensive than existing alternatives.

Description

The award will consist of $5,000 and a certificate. Up to $2,500 for travel expenses to the meeting at which the award will be presented will be reimbursed.

Eligibility

Nominee eligibility is neither contingent on the timeframe in which the technology was developed, nor on demonstrated commercial success. Discoveries must have significant commercial potential, however, to be considered for award. The award will be granted regardless of race, gender, age, religion, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, gender expression, gender identity, presence of disabilities, and educational background.

Nominees may include:

• Individuals
• Research teams (maximum 3 individuals)
• Representatives from an organization (company, university, or national lab)
• Professors or other academic-based teams whose work has been commercialized

Deadline

November 1 (annual review)

How to Apply

The nomination period is open from July 1 to November 1. Learn more about ACS National Award Nominations.

Judging Process

Priority may be given to nominees that represent organizations in a position to directly commercialize, or organizations that can participate in commercialization through technology transfer (i.e., academic institutions that have technology licensing programs).

Green chemistry principles and criteria are based on those employed in consideration of the ACS Green Chemistry Institute's Kenneth G. Hancock Memorial Student Award in Green Chemistry and the Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award.

Affordability and practicality of a qualified application are evidenced by discoveries that:

• Conform to existing manufacturing infrastructures with little or no additional investment in equipment or personnel to operate the manufacturing process,
• Or are totally new products whose economics are compelling even after considering market prices for currently available alternatives, costs of starting materials, manufacturing yield and throughput, manufacturing labor, and equipment and facilities costs.

Sponsor

Dow

History

The award was established in 2007 and is supported, beginning in 2009, through an endowment by Rohm and Haas Company, now a wholly owned subsidiary of Dow.

Past Recipients

• 2022 - Mahdi M. Abu-Omar
• 2021 - Kerry Gilmore, Peter Seeberger, and Andreas Seidel-Morgenstern
• 2020 - Dimitris I. Collias, Jane E. Godlewski, and Juan E. Velásquez Velez
• 2019 - Richard A. Gross
• 2018 - B. Frank Gupton and David Tyler McQuade
• 2017 - Peter J. Dunn
• 2016 - Martin D. Johnson, Joseph R. Martinelli, and Shannon S. Stahl
• 2015 - John Frye, Todd Werpy, and Alan Zacher
• 2014 - Arthur J. Ragauskas
• 2013 - Hari B. Sunkara
• 2012 - William J. Kruper
• 2011 - Richard P. Wool
• 2010 - Vincent J. D’Amico, Emiel H. van Broekhoven, and Juha J. Jakkula
• 2009 - Geoffrey W. Coates

Contact Information

Awards Office
American Chemical Society
1155 16th Street NW
Washington, DC 20036-4801
Phone: 202-872-4575
Fax: 202-776-8008
awards@acs.org