Chemical analysis

• Resources needed for warmth, shelter, food and transport

  • Natural resources like food, wood for building, fuels for burning, materials for making fabrics and clothing
  • New materials to help meet increasing demands without compromising future generations' abilities
• Sustainability


  Doing so without compromising future Generations abilities to do the same
• Many people around the world don't have access to clean drinking water (potable water)
• Potable water production


  1. Take water from fresh water source

  2. Pass through filter beds to remove large insoluble particles

  3. Sterilize to kill microbes, usually using chlorine, ozone or UV light
• Desalination


  Get sea water and remove the salt, can be done through distillation or using special membranes that employ reverse osmosis
• Desalination and distillation require a huge amount of energy
• Potable water isn't pure water, pure or distilled water is dangerous to drink in large amounts
• Wastewater treatment


  1. Screening and grit removal

  2. Sedimentation to produce sludge and effluent

  3. Treat sludge with anaerobic digestion

  4. Treat effluent with aerobic respiration
• Metals extraction


  Obtained from their ore after mining by electrolysis or displacement reactions
• New ways of extracting metals

  • Phyto mining
  • Bioleaching
• Phyto mining and bioleaching yield incredibly small amounts of the metal
• Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)

  Thought process carried out to predict a new product's impact on the environment, considering extraction and processing of raw materials, manufacturing and packaging, use over lifetime, and disposal
• Ways to reduce environmental impact

  • Reduce use of products in general
  • Reduce materials needed, energy required, and waste produced
  • Recycle materials
• Corrosion


  Materials being destroyed slowly over time by chemical reactions, e.g. iron rusting
• Sacrificial metal


  A more reactive metal that corrodes before the other metal, used to coat and protect it
• Alloys


  Mixtures of different metals, usually stronger than pure metals
• Ceramics


  Made from clay, heated in a furnace
• Composites


  Materials made from two materials, usually involving fibers of one material being bound together with another
• Polymers


  Can be high or low density, thermosoftening or thermosetting
• Haber process


  Used to make ammonia, nitrogen taken from air, hydrogen from electrolysis of water, passed over catalyst at high temperature and pressure
• Plants need nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, so many fertilizers are NPK fertilizers
• Potassium chloride, potassium sulfate and phosphate rock are obtained by mining, then treated before going into fertilizers