1. Environmental Science Inquiry and Applications Cunningham • Cunningham
Principles of
Environmental Science
Inquiry and Applications
Third Edition
Cunningham • Cunningham
Chapter 13 Lecture Outlines*
*See PowerPoint Image Slides for all figures and tables pre-inserted into PowerPoint without notes.
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2. Solid and Hazardous Waste
Chapter 13

3. Outline:
Solid Waste
Waste Disposal Methods
Shrinking the Waste Stream
Recycling
Hazardous and Toxic Wastes
Federal Legislation
RCRA
CERCLA
Management Options

4. WASTE
According to EPA, U.S. produces 11 billion tons of solid waste annually.
About half is agricultural waste.
More than one-third is mining related.
Industrial Waste million metric tons.
Hazardous/Toxic - 60 million metric tons.
Municipal Waste million metric tons.
Two kg per person / per day.
Waste Stream1.Steady production of all waste we produce.

5. U.S. Domestic Waste

6. WASTE DISPOSAL METHODS
2. Individual reduction has a cumulative effect.
Open Dumps 3. “midnight dumping” & orphan sites are illegal and threaten health
Open, unregulated dumps are still the predominant method of waste disposal in developing countries.
Most developed countries forbid open dumping.
Estimated 200 million liters of motor oil are poured into the sewers or soak into the ground each year in the U.S.
Five times volume of Exxon Valdez.

7. WASTE DISPOSAL METHODS CONT’D
Landfills
Sanitary Landfills4.Differ from open dumps
Refuse compacted and covered everyday with a layer of dirt.
Dirt takes up as much as 20% of landfill space.5. waterproof lining prevents leaching
Since 1994, all operating landfills in the U.S. have been required to control hazardous substances.

8. Sanitary Landfills

9. Additional landfills
6. Deep well injection & surface impoundments, “ponds” of leachate
7. Topography & drainage proximity to aquifer recharge & permeability of underground rock

10. Landfills
Historically, landfills have been a convenient, inexpensive waste-disposal option.
Increasing land and shipping fees, and demanding construction and maintenance requirements are increasing costs.
Suitable landfill sites are becoming scarce.
Increasingly, communities are rejecting new landfills.
Old landfills are quickly reaching capacity and closing.

11. WASTE DISPOSAL METHODS CONT’D
Exporting Waste
Although most industrialized nations have agreed to stop shipping hazardous and toxic waste to less-developed countries, the practice still continues.
Garbage imperialism also operates in wealthier countries.
Indian reservations increasingly being approached to store wastes on reservations.

12. WASTE DISPOSAL METHODS CONT’D
Incineration and Resource Recovery
Energy Recovery - Heat derived from incinerated refuse is a useful resource.
Steam used for heating buildings or generating electricity.

13. Incinerator Types
Refuse-Derived Fuel - Refuse is sorted to remove recyclable and unburnable materials.
Higher energy content than raw trash.
Mass Burn - Everything smaller than major furniture and appliances loaded into furnace.
Creates air pollution problems.
Reduces disposal volume by 80-90%.
Residual ash usually contains toxic material.

14. Mass-Burn Garbage Incinerator

15. Incinerator Cost and Safety
Initial construction costs are usually between $100 and $300 million for a typical municipal facility.
Tipping fess are often much higher than tipping fees at landfills.
EPA has found alarmingly high toxin levels in incinerator ash.
Concentrated in fly ash.
Pollution control methods are not guaranteed to be 100% effective.

16. SHRINKING THE WASTE STREAM
Recycling 8.Melting or shredding
Recycling is the reprocessing of discarded materials into new, useful products.
Currently, about two-thirds of all aluminum cans are recycled.
Half of all aluminum cans on grocery shelves will be made into another can within two months.

17. Recycling
Potential Problems
Market prices fluctuate wildly.
Contamination
Most of 24 billion plastic soft drink bottles sold annually in the U.S. are PET, which can be melted and remanufactured into many items.
But a single PVC bottle can ruin an entire truckload of PET if melted together.

18. U.S. Recycling Rates

19. Recycling Cont’d
Benefits 9. recycling less $ than landfill or inceneration
Saves money, raw materials, and land.
Encourages individual responsibility.
Reduces pressure on disposal systems.
Japan recycles about half of all household and commercial wastes.
10. U.S. uses landfills
11. Same standard of living
Lowers demand for raw resources.
Reduces energy consumption and air pollution.

20. Recycling Cont’d
Benefits Example 12. saves landfill space
Recycling 1 ton of aluminum saves 4 tons of bauxite ore, 700 kg of petroleum coke and pitch, and keeps 35 kg of aluminum fluoride out of the air.
Producing aluminum from scrap instead of bauxite ore cuts energy use by 95%.
Yet still throw away more than a million tons of aluminum annually.

21. SHRINKING THE WASTE STREAM
Composting 13.vastly reduces waste stream
Biological degradation of organic material under aerobic conditions.
Demanufacturing
Disassembly and recycling of obsolete consumer products.
Reuse
Reusable glass container makes an average of 15 round-trips between factory and customer before it has to be recycled.

22. SHRINKING THE WASTE STREAM CONT’D
Producing Less Waste 14. Reduce is most overlooked “R”
Excess packaging of food and consumer products is one of our greatest sources of unnecessary waste.
Paper, plastic, glass, and metal packaging material make up 50% of domestic trash by volume.
Increase use of photodegradable and biodegradable plastics.
Too much emphasis on recycling?

23. HAZARDOUS AND TOXIC WASTES
15. HAZMAT’S chemicals that present a hazard or risk
EPA estimates U.S. industries generate 265 million metric tons of officially classified hazardous wastes annually.
At least 40 million metric tons of toxic and hazardous wastes are released into the environment each year.

24. Hazardous Waste
Legally, hazardous waste is any discarded liquid or solid that contains substances known to be:
Fatal to humans or laboratory animals in low doses.
Toxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic, or teratogenic to humans or other life-forms.
Ignitable with a flash point less than 60o C.
Corrosive
Explosive or highly reactive.

25. 16.
A. Heavy metals: lead, mercury, arsenic, cadmium, tin, chromium, zinc, copper
B. synthetic organics: plastics, fibers, rubber, paint, solvents, pesticides, & preservative

26. Hazardous Waste Disposal
Federal Legislation
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA)
Comprehensive program requiring rigorous testing and management of toxic and hazardous substances.
Cradle to grave accounting.
17. Tracking from creation to gone

27. 18.
A. Must have a permit.
B. Toxic waste must be pretreated to prevent leaching
C. Toxic substances must be documented when transported

28. Cradle to Grave

29. Federal Legislation
Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA).
Modified in 1984 by Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act.
Aimed at rapid containment, cleanup, or remediation of abandoned toxic waste sites.
Toxic Release Inventory - Requires 20,000 manufacturing facilities to report annually on releases of more than 300 toxic materials.

30. CERCLA
Government does not have to prove anyone violated a law, or what role they played in a superfund site.
Liability under CERCLA is “strict, joint, and several”, meaning anyone associated with a site can be held responsible for the entire clean-up cost.19. ONE OF the biggest problems with clean-up
20. Occupational Safety & Health Act

31. Superfund Sites
EPA estimates 36,000 seriously contaminated sites in the U.S.
By 2004, 1,671 sites had been placed on the 21.National Priority List for cleanup with with Superfund financing.
Superfund is a revolving pool designed to:
Provide immediate response to emergency situations posing imminent hazards.
Clean-up abandoned or inactive sites.

32. Superfund Sites Cont’d
Total costs for hazardous waste cleanup in the U.S. are estimated between $370 billion and $1.7 trillion.
For years, most of the funding has gone to legal fees, but this situation has improved over past several years.
Studies of Superfund sites reveal minorities tend to be over-represented in these neighborhoods.

33. How Clean is Clean
Brownfields - Contaminated properties that have been abandoned or are not being used up to potential because of pollution concerns.
Up to one-third of all commercial industrial sites in urban core of many big cities fall into this category.
In many cases, property owners complain that unreasonably high purity levels are demanded in remediation programs. 22. degree of purity: another problem

34. Hazardous Waste Management Options
23. Integrated waste management
Produce Less Waste
Avoid creating wastes in the first place
Recycle and Reuse
Convert to Less Hazardous Substances
Physical Treatment (Isolation)
Incineration
Chemical Processing (Transformation)
Bioremediation (Microorganisms)

35. 24. neutralizing for safe disposal
25. to absorb & detoxify
26. Continues to threaten public health
27. Built like a bathtub with a lid
28. NOT gravel
29. Toxic landfills are located in urban areas

36. Hazardous Waste Management Options Cont’d
Store Permanently
Retrievable Storage
Can be inspected and periodically retrieved.
Secure Landfills
Modern, complex landfills with multiple liners and other impervious layers and monitoring systems.

37. Secure Landfills

38. Summary:
Solid Waste
Waste Disposal Methods
Shrinking the Waste Stream
Recycling
Hazardous and Toxic Wastes
Federal Legislation
RCRA
CERCLA
Management Options