VACANCY
FOR A POST-DOCTORAL RESEARCHER
Ghent University, Research Group ENVOC, (www.envoc.ugent.be), makes in 2010 and 2011 the investigation on the implementation of eco²-efficiency (ecological and economical) tools for chemical products and processes at SMEs.
This research is a cooperation between essenscia Flanders (Federation of Chemical companies), VITO (Flemish Institute for Technological Research) and Ghent University. The research is funded by the European Fund for Regional Development and start early 2010 for a period of 2 years.
Applicants should have obtained a PhD degree and have feeling with chemistry and/or environmental impact. They should be able to cooperate with different actors.
More information and application should go through e-mail to Prof. J. Dewulf (jo.dewulf@ugent.be).
Project description:
Sustainable development is key for a world where the needs of the current population are met without compromising those of future generations. Since chemistry provide basic products, it will continue to play a key role in sustainable development. If the Flemish region aims at keeping a top position in chemistry by 2020, it will have to go for “sustainable chemistry” as a strategy. More and more companies and institutes will implement sustainability principles in this perspective. However, it will not make sense to claim sustainability implementation without a tangible improvement. It is therefore essential that decisions can be critically verified by objective measurement techniques. These kinds of analysis provide at the same time possibilities to explore new opportunities, to anticipate on risks and to benchmark products, processes and even facilities and clusters.
Today more and more research centers and companies offer metrics for this kind of assessment. Nevertheless, it is today not always clear which tools are useful for what purposes, in particular for SMEs. Also due to economic reasons implementation at SMEs is limited. Larger companies often develop their own tools, but due to the complexity of the theme frequently not all expertise is available. In this context this project should provide more clarity on the tools by bringing expertise together.