Anthias’ Senior Consultant Dr Diane Turner will be doing a talk on Gas Chromatography & GC-MS Sustainability & Health Check. Further on from her earlier talk on laboratory sustainability, Diane Turner will focus specifically on sustainability within the techniques of gas chromatography and mass spectrometry. This will include a step-by-step approach to the different stages of sample analysis using these techniques, from discussing your laboratory gas supply through to mass spectrometric detection. Ideas and tips will be shared on the gases used, inlet modes of operation, column internal diameters and flow rates, oven temperatures, GC detector flows, MS vacuum systems. Finally, the presentation will touch upon the importance of gas saver modes, standby methods, preventative maintenance and troubleshooting to avoid leaks, reduce power consumption and improve sustainability.

Dr Diane Turner & Dr Pernilla Sörme from My Green Lab will be doing a talk on The Sustainable Lab: Practical Tips for Lab Management and Sample Analysis. Recent years have seen the emergence of a laboratory sustainability movement around the world but the practicalities of this are challenging. They are highly specialised and resource intensive spaces that require specialised buildings, equipment and even personnel. However, for the laboratories this is a great opportunity for improvement and taking small actions can have a big impact. Greatest success has been seen when frameworks address laboratory sustainability holistically by encouraging scientists to reduce energy, water, waste, and hazardous chemical use. The not-for-profit organisation ‘My Green Lab’ provides a comprehensive program that not only shows the benefit of reducing the environmental footprint on the laboratories, but also encourages behaviour changes that achieve an enduring culture of sustainability. This talk will begin with some general practical aspects on how laboratories can achieve better sustainability with takeaway practical tips to empower change. Diane Turner will move the talk onto the specific area of analytical chemistry, exploring the ways you can assess or develop your method from a sustainability point of view by implementing a step-by-step plan from sample collection through transport, storage, analysis and reporting. Using GC &GC-MS as an example she will run through ideas for each step. This will progress onto useful tips for considering sustainability during the process of instrument acquisition. These improvements not only have a positive environmental effect but can also improve long-term cost efficiency whilst maintaining sample integrity and producing accurate and reproducible results.

Dr Giles Edwards will be doing a talk on Moving Towards Sustainable Analysis: Liquid Chromatography, LC-MS & ICP-MS Instrumentation, Applications, Reporting and the Analyst. Sustainable laboratory practices encompass social, economic and environmental factors that may be adopted and improved upon in part by the analyst; sustainability starts at home and in our case the lab. The analytical method development process is designed to optimise how we get answers to questions related to chemical measurements which are usually both quantitative and qualitative, there is always room for improvement. The choice of instrumentation that improves sensitivity, speed, selectivity and specificity of an analytical method such as migration from HPLC to UHPLC and solvent recycling will all contribute to a more sustainable laboratory workflow. Sustainable instrument development practices will also be discussed including the development of novel ICP-MS instrumentation and its hyphenation to laser spectroscopy, the reuse of modular components, reduction of energy consumption, 3D printing of prototypes and upcycling. The adoption of the “reduce, reuse and recycle” mantra, green chemistry techniques, moving away from single use plastics, data management and storage strategies all contribute to a more sustainable future; these will all be discussed with strategies for implementation and efficient integration within existing analytical workflows. Finally product life cycle and the feasibility of instrument re-use and re-deployment with academics in developing countries will be investigated and how this makes positive impact on our global sustainability goals.