Atom Economy Calculator

Measure the efficiency of a chemical reaction by calculating the percentage of starting materials that end up in the desired product.

Reaction Weights

FW of Desired Product

Total FW of All Reactants

Calculation Results

Enter weight details to calculate reaction efficiency

About this calculator

Overview

Atom economy (atom efficiency) is the conversion efficiency of a chemical process in terms of all atoms involved and the desired products produced.

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Pro Tips

FW stands for Formula Weight (or Molar Mass).
Higher atom economy means less waste is generated by the reaction.
Consider the stoichiometry of the balanced chemical equation when entering total reactant weight.

Fun Facts

"Atom economy is the second principle of Green Chemistry and one of the most widely used metrics for measuring reaction efficiency."
"Introduced by Barry Trost in 1991, it helps minimize waste at the molecular level and reduces environmental and economic costs."
"A reaction can have high yield but poor atom economy if it produces substantial byproducts - the two metrics are different."
"Ibuprofen synthesis was improved from 40% to 77% (and now ~99% with recycling) atom economy, significantly reducing waste on an industrial scale."
"Atom economy can be enhanced through catalysts, tandem reactions, and careful selection of starting materials."
"The 'E-factor' (Environmental factor) is another metric that measures the ratio of mass of waste per mass of product."
"Rearrangement and addition reactions theoretically have 100% atom economy as all atoms in the reactants end up in the product."
"Substitution and elimination reactions often have lower atom economy because they inherently produce byproducts."

Formula: Atom Economy (%) = (FW of Desired Product / Total FW of All Reactants) × 100