Advancing Sustainable Chemistry to Protect Public Health
December 3, 2025
Americans are exposed to potentially dangerous levels of chemicals called phthalates, which are widely used to make plastics pliable, the Washington Posts reports. Such public exposures reinforce the need to move toward “sustainable chemistry,” a concept that Joel Tickner and his coauthors detail in Issues. The goal is to eliminate health and environmental hazards from the start, through the design of chemicals and the processes used to make them. This will require “transformative change across the chemistry enterprise,” the authors write, “moving sustainable chemistry from a scientific research concept to a critical player in solving major societal challenges.”