The aim of this study is to introduce and showcase the applicability of the ‘Green-by-Design method’, a tool created by the cooperative Cosun that integrates different indicators involving economic, environmental, inherent safety and health aspects for comparative analysis at an early design stage. Two case studies are presented to exemplify the evaluation principles and steps considered along the ‘Green-by-Design method’: ethylene glycol production and fava bean protein isolate extraction. The results indicate that the ‘Green-by-Design method’ provides a comprehensive comparison of different design concepts, by combining various indicators into a single score, enabling sustainability to be an integral aspect in the decision-making during an early design phase.@en

Valorization of carbon dioxide towards value added chemicals can drastically mitigate the increased CO2 levels in the atmosphere. In this context, formic acid is a versatile bulk chemical with promising market potential. The novel process design proposed in this work involves a sustainable thermochemical synthesis of formic acid from CO2, which is rigorously simulated using Aspen Plus V12 as a CAPE tool. The process relies on the reverse water-gas shift reaction (RWGS) to synthesize CO from green H2 and CO2. The purified CO is used for the synthesis of methyl formate, which is then hydrolyzed to produce formic acid. To address downstream processing energy intensity, a distillation column with a dividing wall (DWC) is employed. The designed process achieves high molar yields of 95% for CO2 and 96% for H2 with a specific energy intensity of 21.8 MJ/kg of formic acid. The new process achieves a substantial reduction of 51% in the CO2 emissions, 64% in electricity consumption and 20% in steam usage as compared to conventional fossil fuel-based FA production plants (reference case).@en