Campus news

Media Advisory: Green Chemistry conference at UC Berkeley March 24

By Robert Sanders

ATTENTION: Environment and science reporters, editors, producers

WHAT

“Green Chemistry: Collaborative Approaches & New Solutions,” a national conference at the University of California, Berkeley, highlighting the campus’s unique, collaborative approach to sustainable, clean and safer chemistry.

Sponsored by the Berkeley Center for Green Chemistry and the Berkeley Institute of the Environment, the conference is funded by the Philomathia Foundation.

WHO

Among the speakers are:

  • Paul Anastas, assistant administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Research and Development
  • Robert Grubbs, professor of chemistry, California Institute of Technology, and 2005 Nobel Laureate in chemistry
  • Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto), California state senator
  • Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles), majority policy leader, California state assemblyman
  • Lynn Goldman, dean of the School of Public Health and Health Services at George Washington University
  • John Warner, president, Warner Babcock Institute for Green Chemistry
  • John Balbus, senior advisor for public health, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health
  • Henry Bryndza, director for technology, DuPont

WHEN

9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., this Thursday, March 24

WHERE

Sutardja Dai Hall on the UC Berkeley campus. Click here for directions.

DETAILS

The Berkeley Center for Green Chemistry (BCGC) was founded in the fall of 2009 to promote sustainable chemistry and safer chemicals, focusing on a multidisciplinary approach that incorporates all aspects of chemistry, from research and development to consumers and the environment. One goal is to train students to think about environmental and health impacts when designing new chemical syntheses or processes, but also to encourage researchers to get involved in the economic, legal, public health and business aspects of green chemistry.

The conference brings together experts in green chemistry to discuss these issues in the context of UC Berkeley’s new center. It will introduce the collaborative, interdisciplinary approaches piloted by BCGC and will feature leaders in these fields who will speak to the role of green chemistry in responding to society’s most pressing health, environmental and economic problems.