Green Chemistry
Catalysis Laboratory

Partners

Iowa State University provides a natural setting for the Green Chemistry Catalysis Laboratory. The agricultural and biological strengths of one of the nation’s premier land-grant universities are coupled with the physical sciences expertise of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory. This coupling of a land-grant university with a national laboratory is unique in the nation as well as in the DOE’s national laboratory system.

These partnerships are particularly well established in the biological sciences. Many scientists in the GCCL are also active in the Biorenewable Resources Consortium. The BRC was formed on the ISU campus to develop the scientific basis for increasing the use of biorenewable resources as a significant source for energy and chemical feedstocks. The BRC’s administrating partners include the Ames Laboratory, the USDA Agriculture and Home Economics Experiment Station and ISU’s newly created Plant Sciences Institute. However, scientists, engineers, economists, rural sociologists and others from across campus as well as representatives from Iowa’s industries are involved in BRC project teams.

The BRC is coupled to another and yet larger consortium, the newly formed Midwest Bio-Based Materials and Energy Consortium. This regional consortium has goals similar to the BRC. In addition to Ames Laboratory and ISU, members include the Argonne National Laboratory, the USDA Peoria Laboratory, the University of Illinois, Michigan State University and Purdue University. The founding premise of this consortium is that agriculture is regional in scope and challenges to and opportunities for promoting a bio-based economy should be addressed regionally.

The GCCL plans to develop similar linkages in other areas of catalysis research such as with the Green Chemistry Institute.

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