Guest Editorial for the Accounts of Chemical Research special issue “Sustainable Polymers”. The invention of plastics was both a blessing and a curse. As an example, plastics save energy when used to lightweight cars and planes, but they consume energy during their production. Similarly, while their durability is an advantage in their applications, it becomes a liability when polluting the environment. Plastics are used in products that keep us safe (e.g., masks and safety goggles), yet they generate pollution which threatens our health. They are inexpensive and deployed in single-use applications, yet they immediately become waste that needs to be managed. Simply put, we cannot live without plastics, and we cannot live with them. What is now clear is that our addiction to plastics is at a crossroads, and a business-as-usual approach moving forward will no longer suffice. The polymer community─including both industrial and academic chemists and engineers─is actively working to develop more sustainable options for the plastics ecosystem. While new materials discovery has been at the forefront of these efforts for the last two decades, new approaches for reuse and recycling plastics via chemical transformations also are now being explored. The overarching goal of these efforts is to maintain the advantages of plastics while reducing their negative impact. One approach is focused on using nature-derived materials─both monomers and polymers─with the assumption that these resources are renewable (though this may be unlikely on the scale of the polymer industry) and potentially benign to human health and the environment. As an example, some researchers are focused on shifting from fossil-fuel-derived chemical feedstocks to biomass-derived monomers and carbon dioxide. A related approach involves functionalizing natural polymers through synthetic processes. In both cases, catalysis plays an essential role, and new catalyst/ligand development is utilized to improve reactivity and selectivity. Another approach is focused on altering the end-of-life fate of plastics. For example, some researchers are developing materials that biodegrade into nontoxic byproducts to mitigate accidental or intentional environmental exposure. In this work, the rates of biodegradation are critical to implementation as well as the toxicity of the degraded products. Alongside this work is research focused on designing new materials that can be chemically recycled to monomeric units or into another chemical feedstock. Others are developing methods that more efficiently reuse existing plastics, either through chemical recycling to alternative feedstocks or through chemical transformations that repurpose the material. This work could take advantage of the existing 6.3 billion metric tons of plastic waste already generated. (1) While these goals are laudable, some caution is warranted as there are few accessible metrics for researchers to determine whether a new material or approach is truly better than what it is aiming to replace. Life cycle and technoeconomic assessments are the most useful, but they are technically challenging to perform, and the results can vary based on the chosen system boundaries. And, while the principles of green chemistry outline some important parameters, they are insufficient, and lack consideration of the end-of-life fate of plastic products. Additional consideration of manufacturability of these sustainable materials in concert with the product value chain are also warranted. We need more researchers to consider a holistic perspective, which considers the entire lifecycle from (cradle) raw materials to end-of-life (grave). Polymer chemists and engineers need training in this area, and we need established protocols and readily accessible data sets for comparative assessments. We need agreed upon metrics and definitions of sustainability, and in the interim, we suggest a focus on more energy-efficient methods, using less toxic materials, and evaluating the postconsumer fate while targeting a lower environmental burden. In this special issue of Accounts of Chemical Research, leading researchers report progress in some of these fundamental areas described above and share their latest results in this exciting area of polymer science and engineering. This article references 1 other publications. This article has not yet been cited by other publications. This article references 1 other publications.

中文翻译：

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可持续聚合物的挑战与机遇

化学研究报告客座社论特刊“可持续聚合物”。塑料的发明既是福也是祸。例如，塑料用于减轻汽车和飞机的重量可以节省能源，但在生产过程中会消耗能源。同样，虽然它们的耐用性在其应用中是一个优势，但在污染环境时却成为一种负担。塑料用于保护我们安全的产品（例如口罩和护目镜），但它们会产生威胁我们健康的污染。它们价格低廉且部署在一次性应用程序中，但它们会立即变成需要管理的废物。简而言之，我们离不开塑料，也无法与塑料共存。现在很清楚的是，我们对塑料的依赖正处于十字路口，向前推进一切照旧的方法将不再足够。聚合物界——包括工业和学术界的化学家和工程师——正在积极致力于为塑料生态系统开发更具可持续性的选择。虽然新材料的发现在过去二十年一直处于这些努力的前沿，但现在也正在探索通过化学转化再利用和回收塑料的新方法。这些努力的总体目标是保持塑料的优势，同时减少其负面影响。一种方法侧重于使用源自自然的材料——包括单体和聚合物——假设这些资源是可再生的（尽管这在聚合物行业的规模上不太可能）并且可能对人类健康和环境无害。举个例子，一些研究人员专注于从化石燃料衍生的化学原料转向生物质衍生的单体和二氧化碳。一种相关的方法涉及通过合成过程对天然聚合物进行功能化。在这两种情况下，催化都起着至关重要的作用，并且利用新的催化剂/配体开发来提高反应性和选择性。另一种方法侧重于改变塑料的报废命运。例如，一些研究人员正在开发可生物降解为无毒副产品的材料，以减少意外或故意的环境暴露。在这项工作中，生物降解率对实施以及降解产物的毒性至关重要。除了这项工作，研究的重点是设计可以化学回收为单体单元或另一种化学原料的新材料。其他人正在开发更有效地再利用现有塑料的方法，无论是通过化学回收到替代原料，还是通过重新利用材料的化学转化。这项工作可以利用现有的 63 亿公吨已经产生的塑料垃圾。(1) 虽然这些目标值得称赞，但仍需谨慎，因为研究人员几乎没有可用的指标来确定一种新材料或方法是否真的比它旨在取代的更好。生命周期和技术经济评估是最有用的，但执行它们在技术上具有挑战性，并且结果可能因所选系统边界而异。和，虽然绿色化学的原则概述了一些重要的参数，但它们还不够，也没有考虑到塑料产品的报废命运。还需要额外考虑这些可持续材料的可制造性以及产品价值链。我们需要更多的研究人员考虑一个整体的角度，考虑从（摇篮）原材料到报废（坟墓）的整个生命周期。高分子化学家和工程师需要这方面的培训，我们需要既定的协议和易于访问的数据集来进行比较评估。我们需要就可持续性的指标和定义达成一致，在此期间，我们建议将重点放在更节能的方法上，使用毒性更低的材料，并评估消费后的命运，同时以降低环境负担为目标。Accounts of Chemical Research，领先的研究人员报告了上述一些基本领域的进展，并分享了他们在这个激动人心的聚合物科学与工程领域的最新成果。本文引用了 1 篇其他出版物。这篇文章尚未被其他出版物引用。本文引用了 1 篇其他出版物。