16. Green Analytical Techniques: Novel and Aboriginal Perspectives on Sustainable Development

Green analytical techniques refer to approaches that decrease or completely remove preservatives, reagents, solvents, and other substances that are dangerous to man and the environment or and that also have the capacity to enhance speed and produce energy-efficient chemical analyses without affecting the quality and the required level of performance of products. This chapter discusses basic principles of green environmental techniques which aim at reducing the impact of chemical activities on man and the environment. These basic principles include energy and water usage reduction, reagent and solvent usage reduction, minimal production of gaseous, liquid and solid, substances during analytical processes, instantaneous analysis for prevention of pollution and intrinsically safer chemistry for prevention of accidents, synthesis of less harmful chemicals, atom economy, prevention, catalysis, design of benign chemicals, use of solvents and auxiliaries that are safer, designing processes that are energy efficient, usage of renewable resources, derivative reduction, and planning for degradation. Emphasis on green separation techniques, green spectrophotometric techniques, basics of green analytical techniques, the problems associated with the formulation of ideologies of green analytical chemistry to existing analytical laboratories, as well as the evaluation of the impact on man and the environment have also been discussed in this chapter.