Proceedings of the International Conference on Engineering, Science, and Urban Sustainability (ICESUS 2025)

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Environmental Sustainable Performance in the Pharmaceutical Industry: A Systematic Review Of Literature

Authors
Josephine Eshun1, *, Michael Odamtten1
1Accra Technical University, Accra, Ghana
*Corresponding author. Email: jeshun@atu.edu.gh
Corresponding Author
Josephine Eshun
Available Online 31 December 2025.
DOI
10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_22How to use a DOI?
Keywords
environmental sustainability; sustainable performance; pharmaceutical industry; green chemistry
Abstract

The pharmaceutical industry, vital to global health, faces significant environmental challenges due to its energy-intensive processes, chemical use, and waste generation, including the presence of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) in water systems, which contributes to ecological harm and antimicrobial resistance. This study aims to assess the environmental impact of pharmaceutical manufacturing processes and also to evaluate the effectiveness of current sustainability initiatives adopted by pharmaceutical firms. This systematic review, guided by PRISMA protocols, evaluates the Environmental Sustainability Performance (ESP) of pharmaceutical manufacturing, analyzing studies from 2020 to 2025 sourced from Scopus, Web of Science, PubMed, and Google Scholar. 10 studies met the inclusion criteria, revealing packaging and API synthesis as the largest impact area. Findings highlight the industry’s substantial environmental footprint, with packaging and API synthesis identified as key areas of impact through Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs). Sustainability initiatives, such as green chemistry, renewable energy adoption, and continuous manufacturing, demonstrate progress in mitigating emissions and waste; however, they face challenges from regulatory complexities and inconsistent supply chain integration.The study underscores the need for standardized ESP metrics, advanced technologies like AI-driven LCAs, and unified regulations to align with global sustainability frameworks.

Copyright
© 2025 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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Volume Title
Proceedings of the International Conference on Engineering, Science, and Urban Sustainability (ICESUS 2025)
Series
Advances in Engineering Research
Publication Date
31 December 2025
ISBN
978-94-6463-970-4
ISSN
2352-5401
DOI
10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_22How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2025 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Cite this article

risenwbib
TY  - CONF
AU  - Josephine Eshun
AU  - Michael Odamtten
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/12/31
TI  - Environmental Sustainable Performance in the Pharmaceutical Industry: A Systematic Review Of Literature
BT  - Proceedings of the International Conference on Engineering, Science, and Urban Sustainability (ICESUS 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 347
EP  - 362
SN  - 2352-5401
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_22
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_22
ID  - Eshun2025
ER  -