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such a contribution was the search for new methodologies or just to look for improved methodology
regarding laboratory production and costs.
On the other hand, we have summarized in Figure 4.4 the theoretical contributions which have been of a
great importance to fix the objectives of Green Analytical Chemistry and to focus the aforementioned tools
by way of avoiding environmental damage as a collateral effect of the analytical practices. So, we can
conclude that in fact the tools for greening the analytical methods were developed years before starting the
movement of Green Analytical Chemistry, and previous to the development of Green Chemistry.
The concepts of Ecological Chemistry [1], Green Chemistry [2], and Green Analytical Chemistry [3],
developed in 1987, 1991 and 1999, respectively, have contributed to put the automation, miniaturization and
direct measurement analytical tools in the frame of an environmentally friendly activity.
If we consider the public actions which have created the institutional support to the Green Analytical
Chemistry, we are convinced that the Pollution Prevention Act of the USA in 1990 [4], the Pimentel report on
Opportunities in Chemistry
of 1995 [5], together with the creation of the Office of Chemical Safety and
Pollution Prevention (EPA) in 1996 [6], and the creation of the EPA Green Chemistry Institute in 1997 [7] are
the cornerstones of the developments in both Green Chemistry and Green Analytical Chemistry.
In the specific case of analytical chemistry, the concepts of clean analytical method and environmentally
friendly methods in 1995 [8], integrated approaches in analytical chemistry [9], and the contribution of
Namiesnik [10] and Kaljurand and Koel [11] have been of a great importance to involve the analytical
community on greening the analytical practices.
4.3
The need for powerful keywords
As a conclusion of the previous sections we must accept that, in spite of the recent publication of three topics
and several special issues of reference journals in the field of analytical chemistry and spectroscopy devoted
to Green Analytical Chemistry, we are far from the general use of environmental friendly keywords in the
analytical papers. So, in contrast with the growing interest on reducing the amount of reagents and energy
consumption and the generation of waste there are only a few papers in which authors evaluate the advantages
of greening the analytical methods together with the deep validation of classical analytical parameters
(accuracy, precision, sensitivity and selectivity) or with the evaluation of the increased speed and limited cost
which offers new methods. So, it is important to insist on the common aspects of our waste and to not dilute
the impact of our efforts, and to do this it is necessary to insist on the evaluation of the environmental side
effects of both proposed and previously available methodologies and to make visible in literature the green
approaches to solve analytical problems. To do it, the appropriate selection of powerful keywords which
could be useful to recover these works from scientific literature is mandatory.
Figure 4.5 summarizes the environmental and practical keywords employed up until today to describe the
efforts made to avoid the environmental deleterious effects of the analytical methods and the need for a
general use of a green terminology because, as Linthorst has clearly shown regarding Green Chemistry in his
review
An Overview: Origins and Developments of Green Chemistry
[12] the green terms become the most
popular alternative regarding Green Chemistry, being found in less than 10 references per year which focus
on being sustainable or clean chemistry and less than 50 which call their efforts environmental contributions,
in spite of the fact that the number of articles per year which include the term Green Chemistry has been
growth to most of 350-400 in the last two years.
In such a way, the analytical chemistry must also move to the general use of the term Green Analytical
Chemistry in order to be clearly identified with other environmental conservation movements and it would
beneficial for the whole community that efforts for greening our practices could be easily identified in the
scientific literature.
