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Advancing Safe and Sustainable by design Practices in Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

Project description

Sustainable technologies for the pharmaceutical industry

The healthcare sector contributes 3-8 % of CO2 emissions in OECD countries and consumes vast resources. PharmEco, supported by the EU and private partners of the Innovative Health Initiative, aims to transform the pharmaceutical industry by adopting more sustainable manufacturing practices. The project will explore innovative technologies and processes in chemical synthesis, biomanufacturing and decontamination to reduce the use of solvents, substances of very high concern, energy and water. It will scale-up SSbD-driven technologies, optimise manufacturing processes and develop digital decision-support for sustainability steering. Additionally, PharmEco will establish harmonised guidelines for environmental impact evaluation, providing a comprehensive toolkit for sustainable pharmaceutical production and life cycle assessment, ultimately fostering a greener and more responsible healthcare sector.

Objective

PHARMECO is supported by the Innovative Health Initiative Joint Undertaking (IHI JU). The JU receives support from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme and COCIR, EFPIA, Europa Bío, MedTech Europe, and Vaccines Europe.
The project's overall objective is to revolutionize pharmaceutical manufacturing towards sustainability by integrating environmentally friendly technologies/processes and harmonized sustainability assessments methods into healthcare industry practices. This encompasses early design phase, operation, and eventual use and disposal. The project's first objective is to enhance the early-stage development of pharmaceutical products by implementing Sustainable-by-Design (SSbD)-driven process-intensified platforms (e.g. continuous manufacturing). This involves designing sustainable processes based on so-called SELECT (Safety, Environment, Legal, Economy, Control and Throughput) criteria and setting up eco-friendly systems for producing small molecules, peptides, oligo-nucleotides, proteins and ribonucleic acid (RNA) with advanced control measures. Next, PHARMECO aims to scale up and demonstrate environmentally-friendly processes for industrial manufacturing and decontamination, which includes creating infrastructure for studying key unit operations with sustainable technology and for SSbD-driven process intensified manufacture at a scale sufficient for clinical testing and a manufacturing process that is easily transferred to a Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) environment. PHARMECO also aims to steer the development of (bio)manufacturing processes towards sustainable production through digital decision-making tools. This involves creating a modular digital tool for assessing sustainability from multiple perspectives, evaluating practices. Finally, the project seeks to establish a standardized approach for assessing the environmental sustainability of pharmaceuticals, which involves collaboration with various stakeholders to create scientifically robust guidelines, applying consistent Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodologies, and facilitate regulatory adoption of standardized LCA practices.
By integrating sustainability considerations into every phase of manufacturing, PHARMECO will positively revolutionize pharmaceutical industry.

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HORIZON-JU-RIA - HORIZON JU Research and Innovation Actions

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(opens in new window) HORIZON-JU-IHI-2023-04-two-stage

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Coordinator

UNIVERSITEIT GENT
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 3 964 698,75
Address
SINT PIETERSNIEUWSTRAAT 25
9000 GENT
Belgium

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Region
Vlaams Gewest Prov. Oost-Vlaanderen Arr. Gent
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Links
Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 3 964 698,75

Participants (27)

Partners (26)

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