Nanotechnology refers broadly to a field of applied science and technology whose unifying theme is the control of matter on the atomic and molecular scale, normally 1 to 100 nanometers. Nanotechnology is and continues to be in the forefront of engineering and science research. Applications of nanotechnology are in many sectors including consumer products, health care, transportation, energy and agriculture. In addition, nanotechnology presents new environmental control technologies for pollution prevention and environmental remediation [1]. Although, benefits of nanotechnology are significant, the environmental impact and ecological footprint of nanotechnology products is not completely known. Further, most of the research in this area is restricted to the pilot plant scale. In order for this technology to be commercially successful, one has to study the designs for scale up. An important tool to evaluate environmental impacts of nanotechnology is the life cycle analysis (LCA). LCA attempts to trace out the major stages and processes involved over the entire life cycle of a product in a “cradle-to-grave” approach. By including the impacts throughout the product life cycle, LCA provides a comprehensive view of the environmental aspects of the product or process and a more accurate picture of the true environmental trade-offs in product selection [2-3]. At the crux of the life cycle analysis is the life cycle inventory analysis (LCI) which is a data driven step. Life cycle analysis is very important in the context of new and emerging technologies or nanomaterial manufacturing. However, for these technologies production and scale up, data is either not available or is minimal, making LCI the most difficult step in LCA and impact analysis [4]. Process simulators can provide a way around this problem especially for emerging technologies. In the new nanotechnology center, we propose to develop a specialized simulator for nanomaterials manufacturing which will provide the first step towards circumventing this difficulty. This will be a specialized simulator designed to handle: high numerical precision, rate based as well as equilibrium models, fate and transport properties for unconventional materials, properties (and prediction models) derived from molecular modeling and simulations [5], batch, semi-continuous, and continuous processing, and uncertainties.

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