Abstract
Every innovation seeks to become a profitable business, with this considered to be the engine for economic prosperity. When an innovation is revolutionary, its long-term consequences can be revolutionary too. The Haber-Bosh process for ammonia synthesis is arguably the twentieth century’s most significant innovation, and its importance to global food production and its impact on the environment are not expected to diminish over the coming decades. The historical case of the ammonia synthesis process invented by Fritz Haber and the ensuing innovation provides an incomparable opportunity to illustrate the interactions across contemporary needs, prominent scientists, political concerns, moral dilemmas, ethics, governance and environmental implications at a time when the concept of sustainability was still in its infancy. Despite its high economic and environmental costs, no cleaner or more efficient sustainable alternative has so far been found, and so replacing this “old” innovation that still “feeds” a large part of the world’s population does not appear to be on the cards in the near future.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Albino, V., Dangelico, R. M., & Pontrandolfo, P. (2012). Do inter-organizational collaborations enhance a firm´s environmental performance?. A study of the largest U.S. companies. Journal of Cleaner Production, 37, 304–315.
Apodaca, L. (2013). U.S. Geological Survey Minerals Yearbook: Nitrogen (Advance Release). U.S. Geological Survey.
Apodaca, L. (2016). U.S. Geological Survey. Mineral Commodity Summaries (Nitrogen (Fixed)-Ammonia). U.S. Geological Survey.
Boulamanti, A., & Moya, J. (2017). Production costs of the chemical industry in the EU and other countries: Ammonia, methanol and light olefins. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 68, 1205–1212.
Bown, S. R. (2005). A most damnable invention: Dynamite, nitrates and the making of the modern world. London: Macmillan.
Chen, Y. S. (2008). The positive effect of green intellectual capital on competitive advantages of firms. Journal of Business Ethics, 77(3), 271–286.
Cussler, E., & Moggridge, G. (2001). Chemical product design. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
De Medieiros, J. F., Duarte Ribeiro, J. L., & Nogueira Cortimiglia, M. (2014). Success factors for environmentally sustainable product innovation: A systematic literature review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 65, 76–86.
Delaux, P. M., Radhakrishnan, G., & Oldroyd, G. (2015). Current opinion. Plant Biology, 26, 95–99.
Erisman, J. W., Galloway, J. N., Dise, N. B., Sutton, M. A., Bleeker, A., Grizzetti, B., et al. (2015). Nitrogen: Too much of a vital resource. Science Brief. Zeist: WWF.
Erisman, J. W., Sutton, M. A., Galloway, J., Klimont, Z., & Winiwarter, W. (2008). How a century of ammonia synthesis changed the world. Nature Geoscience, 1, 636–639.
Galloway, J. N., Townsend, A. R., Erisman, J. W., Bekunda, M., Cai, Z., Freney, J. R., et al. (2008). Transformation of the nitrogen cycle: recent trends, questions, and potential solutions. Science, 320(5878), 889–892.
Glibert, P. M., Maranger, R., Sobota, D. J., & Bouwman, L. (2014). The Haber Bosch harmful algal bloom (HB-HAB) link. Open Access IOP Publishing. Environmental Research Letters, 9, 1–13.
Habashi, F. (2010). Carl Bosch and his museum. Bulletin of Historical Chemistry, 35(2), 111–114.
Heffer, P. & Prud’homme, M. (2013). Fertilizer outlook 2013–2017. In 81st IFA Annual Conference Proceedings (pp. 20–22).
IASHE. (2014). Formation and development of innovative culture of a personality and a group. The sectorial Congress of the IASHE in field of Psychology. International Academy of Science and Higher Education IASHE (pp. 1–90).
IFA. (2014). Fertilizer Outlook 2014–2019. International Fertilizer Industry Association Press.
Kothari, R., Buddhi, D., & Sawhney, R. L. (2008). Comparison of environmental and economic aspects of various hydrogen production methods. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 12, 553–563.
Liu, H. (2014). Ammonia synthesis catalyst 100 years: Practice, enlightenment and challenge. Chinese Journal of Catalysis, 35, 1619–1640.
Manchester, K. L. (2002). Man of destiny: The life and work of Fritz Haber. Endeavour, 26(2), 64–69.
Murakami, J., Futamata, M., Nakao, Y., Horiuchi, S., Bando, K., Nagashima, U., et al. (2015). Reduction of N2 with H2 on palladium surfaces at low temperatures. Chemical Physics Letters, 618, 1–5.
OECD. (2005). Oslo Manual, The measurement of scientific and technological activities—guidelines for collecting and interpreting innovation data (3rd ed). OECD.
Razon, L. F. (2015). Is nitrogen fixation (once again) “vital to the progress of civilized humanity”? Clean Technology and Environmental Policy, 17, 301–307.
Sabadie, J. A. (2014). Technological innovation, human capital and social change for sustainability. Lessons learnt from the industrial technologies theme of the EU´s research framework programme. Science of the Total Environment, 481, 668–673.
Smil, V. (2011). Nitrogen cycle and world food production. World Agriculture, 2, 9–11.
Travis, A. S. (2015). The synthetic nitrogen industry in World War I. Its emergence and expansion. Berlin: Springer.
UEU in-depth Report. (2013). Nitrogen pollution and the European environment. Implications for air quality policy, European Commission 2013.
Vojvodic, A., Medford, A. J., Studt, F., Abild-Pedersen, F., Suvra Khan, T., Bligaard, T., et al. (2014). Exploring the limits: A low pressure, low-temperature Haber-Bosch process. Chemical Physics Letters, 598, 108–112.
World Commission on Environment and Development. (1987). From one earth to one world: An overview. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Yara. (2014). Yara fertilizer industry handbook. Oslo: Yara.
Yeo, W., Kim, S. K., Park, H., & Kang, J. (2015). A bibliometric method for measuring the degree of technological innovation. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 95, 152–162.
Acknowledgements
This research has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (Project CTM2016-77212-P) and the University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU (Project GIU15/20 and UFI 11/47). Dr. A. Aleksanyan would like to thank the BACKIS project (programme ERASMUS MUNDUS) and the University of the Basque Country (Spain) for their support.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Barona, A., Etxebarria, B., Aleksanyan, A. et al. A Unique Historical Case to Understand the Present Sustainable Development. Sci Eng Ethics 24, 261–274 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-017-9891-5
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-017-9891-5