Green Analytical Chemistry: A Comprehensive Review of Eco-Scale, Greenness Metrics, and Sustainability Approaches

Green analytical chemistry (GAC) is developing quickly at the moment, necessitating the establishment of clear, succinct guidance in the form of GAC principles that will aid in greening laboratory operations. Because they fall short of analytical chemistry's requirements, the current green chemistry and green engineering principles need to be revised for application in GAC. This article presents a collection of 12 principles that will be crucial for GAC's future. These principles include some innovative ideas (like using natural reagents) as well as well-known ones (like reducing the use of energy and reagents and eliminating waste, risk, and hazard). The goal of green analytical chemistry is to make analytical processes safer for people and the environment. When evaluating the greenness of an analytical approach, a wide range of factors are taken into account, including the quantity and toxicity of reagents, waste generated, energy consumption, the number of procedural steps, miniaturization, and automation. The eco-scale assessment (ESA), the green analytical procedure index (GAPI), and the national environmental methods index (NEMI) are the three evaluation techniques.