Unit 9: Waste & Hazardous

Materials

Chapter 18: Solid Waste Management &
Disposal
Chapter 19: Regulating Hazardous Materials

I. Composition of Solid Waste
A. Industrial 10%
B. Municipal 1.5%, 1.24 tons/person/year
C. Mining 75%
D. Agriculture 13% (compost/manure)
E. Sewage 1%
II. Solid Waste Management
A. Primitive dumps unlined and uncovered, resulted in ground
water and air pollution
B. Modern landfills 80% of garbage
1. Solid waste is layered into a plastic-lined pit, then covered
with clay
2. Leachate is treated
3. CH
4
is captured and used for energy
C. Seattle sends waste to Oregon on trains expensive and
fossil fuel intensive
The Story of Stuff
http://storyofstuff.org
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA):
Definitions
Solid Waste
Any garbage or refuse
Sludge from a wastewater
treatment plant, water supply
treatment plant, or air
pollution control facility
Discarded material, including
solid, liquid, semisolid, or
contained gaseous material
resulting from industrial,
commercial, mining,
household, and agricultural
operations
Solid wastes include both
hazardous and
nonhazardous waste
Hazardous Waste
Ignitable (i.e., burns readily),
corrosive, or reactive (e.g.,
explosive)
Contains specified amounts
of toxic chemicals
EPA has developed a list of
over 500 specific hazardous
wastes
Hazardous waste takes
many physical forms and
may be solid, semisolid,
liquid or contained gas
Total
municipal
solid waste
generated
Total
municipal
solid waste
recovered
Total
municipal
solid waste
discarded
What other countries are throwing away
U.S. MSW: Generation, recovery and discards
Modern landfill design
Modern landfill design
Modern
landfill design
Landfills of
the future:
Bioreactor
Landfills of the future:
Closed loop resource recovery
Waste management
Re-thinking the Future: Ellen MacArthur meets Jon Snow
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xj-h1BfmW0

D. Incineration
1. Could generate electricity, as in Tokyo, Japan
cogeneration to heat buildings
2. Toxic ash problem
3. Causes air pollution dioxins from plastic burning
E. Recycling
1. Reduces air and water pollution
2. Reduces fossil fuel consumption
3. Saves money for disposal
4. Makes industry more efficient and profitable
3. Decreases electrical use (Columbia River Dam)
a. Aluminum saves 95% of electricity
b. Steel saves 75%
c. Glass saves 50%
4. Decreases demand for raw materials NYT would
use 62,000 trees every Sunday if not made from
recycled paper

Incineration: Waste to energy

4. Reduces greenhouse gas production 3.5 pounds of CO
2

saved per pound of material recycled
6. Paper is most commonly recycled material
a. Pre-consumer waste sawdust
b. Post-consumer waste paper which has actually been
used, buy this to create demand for recycling
c. Even better, use cloth diapers instead of disposable
7. Metals recycling save
a. 47-74% of electricity
b. 85% of air pollution
c. 76% of water pollution
d. 92% of mining wastes
e. 40% of water use
8. Glass recycling saves
a. 50% of energy
b. 20% of air pollution
c. 80% of mining waste
d. 50% of water
How we get rid of waste

9. Tires to asphalt filler
10. Plastics need to be able to recycle all seven categories
a. Represent 2% of oil used in U.S.
b. #1 PET coke containers are made into fiberfill ski
jackets
c. #2 HDPE milk jugs are made into outdoor furniture
11. Vote with your pocketbook to create demand for recycling,
we must buy recycled materials
F. Source reduction better than reusing or recycling
1. Buy with less packaging use cloth bags
2. National bottle bill saves 125,000 barrels oil, creates
jobs
The waste stream
What we recycle most
How waste is handled around the globe
Time for a national bottle bill!

III. Hazardous Waste
A. Waste that can hurt humans and the environment
produced mainly by industry
1. Hazardous ruins your day
2. Toxic kills you
B. Skin irritants acids and bases
C. Respiratory irritants
1. Black lung coal dust
2. Silicosis silica from mining
3. Asbestosis from insulation, leads to decreased
breathing capacity
4. Particulates
D. Asphyxiants
1. Chemicals which react with oxygen or chemicals that
replace oxygen
2. Examples: CO, CN, H
2
S
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA):
Definitions
Solid Waste
Any garbage or refuse
Sludge from a wastewater
treatment plant, water supply
treatment plant, or air
pollution control facility
Discarded material, including
solid, liquid, semisolid, or
contained gaseous material
resulting from industrial,
commercial, mining, and
agricultural operations
Solid wastes include both
hazardous and
nonhazardous waste
Hazardous Waste
Ignitable (i.e., burns readily),
corrosive, or reactive (e.g.,
explosive)
Contains specified amounts
of toxic chemicals
EPA has developed a list of
over 500 specific hazardous
wastes
Hazardous waste takes
many physical forms and
may be solid, semisolid,
liquid or contained gas
Life cycle of toxic substances

E. Allergens
1. Activate or suppress the immune system
2. Antibodies and histamines are produced
3. Ex: pollen
F. Especially nasty chemicals that have been widely used:
1. Formaldehyde glue, carpets, sick house syndrome
2. PCBs polychlorinated biphenyls, organochlorides used in
electrical equipment and banned in U.S. in 1979
3. Dioxin causes 12 % of all cancers, comes from burning
plastics, making pesticides, agent orange defoliant
G. Toxins potentially deadly chemicals
1. Neurotoxins
a. Attack nerve cells
b. Ex: pesticides like DDT
2. Heavy metals:
a. Lead
b. Mercury
3. Carcinogens cause cancer
a. Largest cause of death of all toxins
b. Four types: radiation, chemical, virus, genes

4. Immune or endocrine system toxins
a. Immune antibodies
b. Endocrine hormones
1) Work by blocking receptor sites
2) Mimic hormones like estrogen
3) Examples: PCBs, dioxins
5. Mutagens cause mutations
6. Teratogens cause birth defects
V. Risk Analysis and Assessment
A. A means of evaluating the risk of one activity compared to
another based on broad assumptions
B. Risk management a policy that guides the expenditure of
funds to reduce risk
1. Prioritizes risks
2. Helps determine how much to spend to bring the risk down
to an acceptable level
3. Based on scientific data politicians can manipulate
4. Local vs. global risk is not spread equally, more industry
where poor and minorities live
C. Perceived vs. true risk Ex: Indoor air is a big problem, but the
public doesn't think so
D. Factors used to determine toxic risk:
1. Solubility
a. Water soluble eliminated by urine
b. Fat soluble non-polar molecules are not eliminated by
urine; stored in fat cells and build up
2. Exposure
a. Acute single exposure
b. Chronic long-term exposure, important with fat-soluble
toxins, they build up in system
3. Carcinogen or mutagen
4. Reactivity how fast it reacts with other chemicals
5. Synergistic effect combination with other toxins increases
negative effect, Ex: alcohol and sleeping pills
6. Environmental risk
a. Bioaccumulation cells store chemicals
b. Biomagnification concentration increases as you go
up the food chain
7. Persistence how long it stays in the environment
8. Problem everybody has different sensitivity to chemicals,
how can you set a standard for everyone
C. Tests
1. LD50 Lethal Dose 50%, the dose in mg/kg which gives an
organism a 50% chance of living
Ex: botulism .0014 mg/kg
Ex: caffeine 5 grams/kg
2. LC50 Lethal Concentration 50%, the concentration in
mg/kg stored in a body to give a 50% chance of living; Ex:
DDT .1 mg/kg (5mg/50kg person)
3. Threshold dose the amount of a chemical which gives the
first response
LD 50 and Dose-Response Graphs
Paracelsus:
The dose
makes the
poison
Philippus Aureolus
Theophrastus Bombastus von
Hohenheim
(14931541)
Founded the discipline of
toxicology
The Habitable Planet: Risk,
Exposure, and Health
http://learner.org/courses/envsci/uni
t/text.php?unit=6&secNum=1
Risk analysis
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IV. Superfund Act
A. Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation,
and Liability Act (CERCLA) commonly known as
Superfund, enacted by Congress on December 11, 1980
B. Requires EPA to make a national priority list of the most toxic
sites in the U.S.
1. 41,000 sites
2. 1226 sites on priority list
C. Taxes chemical and petroleum industries to pay for site clean
up tax is no longer collected and the fund is broke
D. Examples
1. Love Canal, NY
a. Built as canal in 1890s
b. Filled by Hooker Chemical Co. in 1940s
c. Sold to city, which built houses
d. 492 families were evacuated
e. Miscarriages up 300%
f. 56% of children born 1974-78 had birth defects

The Green Chemistry Movement
http://www2.epa.gov/green-chemistry#video
2. Times Beach, MO
a. Dioxin spread on roads with waste oil
b. Town was bought by government and destroyed
3. Hudson Falls, NY GE polluted Hudson River with
PCBs
4. Local smelter sites Everett, Tacoma, Hanford
E. Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA)
1. Three goals:
a. To protect human health and the environment from
the potential hazards of waste disposal
b. To conserve energy and natural resources
c. To reduce the amount of waste generated
2. Regulates the management of solid waste, hazardous
waste, and underground storage tanks holding
petroleum products and other chemicals
Sources of toxic releases
EPA Superfund sites
Tacoma, WA : Asarco smelter site