ABSTRACT
This chapter spotlights trends, breakthroughs, cases and lessons on the development and transfer of sustainable technologies around the world. The 2012 Global Green Research and Development (R&D) report found that private investments in clean technology and green economic and commercial solutions reached $3.6 trillion for the period 2007–12. The sustainable technology innovation wave is only just building. Energy efficiency technologies will certainly help, but there is an equally big innovation opportunity in generating energy from agricultural waste. At present, about 2,500 products carry the Design for the Environment (DfE) Safer Product Label, with compliance verified by certifiers such as NSF Sustainability. Major reductions in the environmental impacts of the chemicals industry–as well as economic benefits–can be achieved by adopting and transferring existing best practice sustainable technologies. The first part of Adelca's sustainable technology solution was to install the electric arc furnace (EAF), thus allowing it to make its own steel billets from recycled scrap steel.
