Themed collection Bio-resources: feeding a sustainable chemical industry

We are delighted to share with you a selection of the papers which will be presented at our Faraday Discussion on Bio-resources: feeding a sustainable chemical industry taking place in London, UK in June 2017. More information about the event may be found here: http://rsc.li/bioresources-fd2017. Additional articles will be added to the collection as they are published. The final versions of all the articles presented and a record of the live discussions will be published after the event.

There is a rapid growth of interest in the use of renewable resources, and in particular bio-resources for the manufacture of future, sustainable chemicals and materials. The first significant market movement in this direction was with biofuels but the rush to produce these without proper consideration of competing uses for resources and the efficiency of the manufacturing processes lead to considerable debate over the true sustainability of the products and processes.  With increasing pressure in Europe, USA and elsewhere to move towards bio-based chemicals it is essential that we underpin the bio-economy with sound and well debated science and technology and that we embrace key chemical technologies including catalysis.