WG3: "THE ENGINEERING PERSPECTIVE"

Objectives
The objectives of the WG3 will include:

1. The environmentally sustainable production of compounds and materials of industrial interest in large scale;
2. The development of new processing methodologies and the design of new reactors to allow the industrial scale-up of mechanochemical processes and (in collaboration with WG2);
3. Provide general guidelines for the scale-up of mechanochemical reactions in general and specifically for mechanochemistry in ball mills for industrial relevant products. This includes an assessment of several parameters and in special cases also the development of test equipment at mini- and / or pilot plant scale;
4. Connect academia to the market and industry through the involvement of entrepreneurs, industrialists and investors, to bring on the market the mechanochemically synthetized products;
5. Identify the process having the lowest impact for the environment, compared to currently used manufacturing processes.

Milestones

1. (M7) Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) assessment;
2. (M8) Assessment of the important parameters during the scale- up process;
3. (M9) Development of reactors to perform reactions isothermally at adjustable temperature levels to overcome the inhomogeneous and non-stationary temperature behaviour during the mechanochemistry reactions;
4. (M10) Evaluation of the environmental impact and energy consumption for large scale manufacturing by twin screw extrusion of one or two (pharmaceutical) materials, to help make a decision compared to how the product(s) are usually manufactured.

Deliverables

1. Prototypes of reactors for: scale-up process, in situ monitoring, temperature control and guidelines and protocols for scale up process;
2. For one or two (pharmaceutical) materials, provide Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP)-certification for large scale manufacturing by TSE, complemented by LCA-based labels. The objective on the harmonization on the nomenclature is common to all WGs, and it will be pursued by a strong collaboration among the participants of this COST action. During the final meeting a report summarizing the guidelines for the mechanochemistry reaction (nomenclature, good laboratory practice, critical parameters, etc.) will be presented to the community.