1 WASTE MANAGEMENT

MODULE-5
HAZARDOUS WASTE MANAGEMENT AND TREATMENT

HAZARDOUS WASTE
Hazardous wastes refer to wastes that may, or tend to cause adverse health effects on
the ecosystem and human beings. These wastes pose present or potential risks to
human health or living organisms, due to the fact that they:
• are non-degradable or persistent in nature
• can be biologically magnified
• Are highly toxic and even lethal at very low concentrations.

Identification
By using either or both of the following criteria, we can identify as to whether or not a
waste is hazardous:
 The list provided by government agencies declaring that substance as hazardous.
 Characteristics such as ignitibility, corrosivity, reactivity and toxicity of the substance.

Listed hazardous wastes (priority chemicals)

A specific list showing certain materials as hazardous wastes minimises the need to test
wastes as well as simplifies waste determination. In other words, any waste that fits the
definition of a listed waste is considered a hazardous waste. Four separate lists cover
wastes from generic industrial processes, specific industrial sectors, unused pure
chemical products and formulations that are either acutely toxic or toxic, and all
hazardous waste regulations apply to these lists of wastes.

We will describe these wastes, classified in the F, K, P, and U industrial waste codes,
respectively, below

F-list: The F-list contains hazardous wastes from non-specific sources, that is, various
industrial processes that may have generated the waste. The list consists of solvents
commonly used in degreasing, metal treatment baths and sludges, wastewaters from
metal plating operations and dioxin containing chemicals or their precursors. Examples of
solvents that are F-listed hazardous wastes, along with their code numbers, include
benzene (F005), carbon tetrachloride (F001).

K-list: The K-list contains hazardous wastes generated by specific industrial processes.
Examples of industries, which generate K-listed wastes include wood preservation,
pigment production, chemical production, petroleum refining, iron and steel production,
explosive manufacturing and pesticide
production.

P and U lists: The P and U lists contain discarded commercial chemical products, off -
specification chemicals, container residues and residues from the spillage of materials.
These two lists include commercial pure grades of the chemical, any technical grades of
the chemical that are produced or marketed, and all formulations in which the chemical is

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

2 WASTE MANAGEMENT

the sole active ingredient.

Characteristics of hazardous wastes

The regulations define characteristic hazardous wastes as wastes that exhibit

measurable properties posing sufficient threats to warrant regulation. For a waste to be
deemed a characteristic hazardous waste, it must cause, or significantly contribute to,
an increased mortality or an increase in serious irreversible or incapacitating reversible
illness, or pose a substantial hazard or threat of a hazard to human health or the
environment, when it is improperly treated, stored, transported, disposed of, or
otherwise mismanaged.

1. Ignitability: A waste is an ignitable hazardous waste, if it has a flash point of less than
60C; readily catches fire and burns so vigorously as to create a hazard or is an
ignitable compressed gas or an oxidizer. A simple method of determining the flash point
of a waste is to review the material safety data sheet, which can be obtained from the
manufacturer or distributor of the material. Naphtha, lacquer thinner, epoxy resins,
adhesives and oil based paints are all examples of ignitable hazardous wastes.

2. Corrosivity: A liquid waste which has a pH of less than or equal to 2 or greater than or
equal to 12.5 considered to be a corrosive hazardous waste. Sodium hydroxide, a
caustic solution with a high pH, is often used by many industries to clean or degrease
metal parts. Hydrochloric acid, a solution with a low pH, is used by many industries to
clean metal parts prior to painting. When these caustic or acid solutions are disposed of,
the waste is a corrosive hazardous waste.

3. Reactivity: A material is considered a reactive hazardous waste, if it is unstable, reacts

violently with water, generates toxic gases when exposed to water or corrosive materials,
or if it is capable of detonation or explosion when exposed to heat or a flame. Examples
of reactive wastes would be waste gunpowder, sodium metal or wastes containing
cyanides or sulphides.

4. Toxicity: To determine if a waste is a toxic hazardous waste, a representative sample

of the material must be subjected to a test conducted in a certified laboratory. The
toxic characteristic identifies wastes that are likely to leach dangerous concentrations of
toxic chemicals into ground water.

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

3 WASTE MANAGEMENT

CLASSIFICATION OF HAZARDOUS WASTE

Hazardous wastes are classified as:

1. Radioactive substance: Substances that emit ionizing radiation are radioactive.

Such substances are hazardous because prolonged exposure to radiation often
results in damage to living organisms. Radioactive substances are of special concern
because they persist for a long period.
2. Chemicals: Most hazardous chemical wastes can be classified into four groups:
synthetic organics, inorganic metals, salts, acids and bases, and flammables and
explosives. Some of the chemicals are hazardous because they are highly toxic to
most life forms. When such hazardous compounds are present in a waste stream at
levels equal to, or greater than, their threshold levels, the entire waste stream is
identified as hazardous.
3. Biomedical wastes: The principal sources of hazardous biological wastes are
hospitals and biological research facilities. This group mainly includes malignant tissues
discarded during surgical procedures and contaminated materials, such as
hypodermic needles, bandages and outdated drugs.
4. Flammable wastes: Most flammable wastes are also identified as hazardous
chemical wastes. This dual grouping is necessary because of the high potential hazard
in storing, collecting and disposing of flammable wastes. These wastes may be liquid,
gaseous or solid, but most often they are liquids. Typical examples include organic
solvents, oils, plasticizers and organic sludge’s.
5. Explosives: Explosive hazardous wastes are mainly ordnance (artillery) materials,
i.e., the wastes resulting from ordnance manufacturing and some industrial gases.
Similar to flammables, these wastes also have a high potential for hazard in storage,
collection and disposal, and therefore, they should be considered separately in addition
to being listed as hazardous chemicals. These wastes may exist in solid, liquid or
gaseous form.

HAZARDOUS WASTE TREATMENT

All the waste products whether from manufacturing process or treatment facility
must be treated for the impurities hazardous to the nature to render them harmless
to the environment.
The various treatment procedures can be classified as:
1. Physical.
2. Chemical.
3. Biological.
4. Thermal.

Physical treatment process

• Reverse osmosis
• Flocculation
• Filtration
• Sedimentation
• Carbon Adsorption
• Distillation

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

4 WASTE MANAGEMENT

1. CARBON ADSORPTION
 The principal use of vapour phase activated carbon in the environmental field is for
the removal of volatile organic compounds such as hydrocarbons, solvents, toxic
gases and organic based odours.
 In addition, chemically impregnated activated carbons can be used to control
certain inorganic pollutants such as hydrogen sulphide, mercury, or radon.
 In the industrial area, the most common applications of activated carbon are for
process off-gases, tank
 vent emissions, work area air purification, and odour control, either within the plant
or related to plant exhausts.
 Additionally, activated carbon is used in the hazardous waste remediation area to
treat off-gases from air
 strippers and from soil vapour extraction remediation projects.

2. Sedimentation
 Sedimentation is the process by which suspended particles are removed from the
water by means of gravity or separation
 In the sedimentation process, the water passes through a relatively quiet and still
basin.
 Sedimentation involves one or more basins, called “clarifiers.” Clarifiers are
relatively large open tanks that are either circular or rectangular in shape.
 The velocity of the water is reduced in the sedimentation tank.
 Sedimentation may remove suspended solids and reduce turbidity by about 50 to
90 percent
 This technique has been widely used in the removal of heavy metals from iron and
steel industry wastewater; removal of fluoride from aluminium production waste
water; and removal of heavy metals from waste water from copper smelting and
from metal finishing industry and waste water stream from organic chemicals

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

5 WASTE MANAGEMENT

Reverse osmosis: Reverse osmosis, also known as RO, is a membrane technology

that uses a semipermeable medium to remove certain ions and particles from a liquid
stream. RO removes contaminants based on their particle size and charge—generally
anything that is 0.0001 µm or larger, including: bacteria • calcium • colloidal particles •
fluoride • iron • manganese • organic material • pyrogens • salt • viruses.

Because of its filtration properties, RO is often used to:

 clean wastewater to acceptable effluent standards or for reuse concentrate
solvents used in the food and beverage industry, such as whey create ultrapure
process water streams, such as required in the microelectronics industry
desalinate seawater or other brine solutions generate potable drinking water
 RO is also the reverse process of osmosis, a phenomenon that occurs naturally
when a lower-solute stream (with a higherwater concentration) migrates toward
a higher-solute stream (with a lower-water concentration) through a
semipermeable membrane to achieve concentrate equilibrium.

4. Distillation
 Distillation is expensive and energy intensive and can probably be justified only
in cases where valuable product recovery is feasible (e.g., solvent recovery).
This technique has only limited application in the treatment of dilute aqueous
hazardous wastes.
 Distillation refers to the selective boiling and subsequent condensation of a
component in a liquid mixture. It is a separation technique that can be used to
either increase the concentration of a particular component in the mixture or to
obtain (almost) pure components from the mixture.
 It is important to note that distillation is not a chemical reaction but it can be
considered as a physical separation process.

Filtration:
 Filtration is well-developed economical process used in the full scale treatment of
many industrial waste waters and waste sludges. Energy requirements are
relatively low, and operational parameters are well defined.
 Filtration is the process of passing water through material to remove particulate
and other impurities, including floc, from the water being treated.
 Impurities like suspended particles (fine silts and clays), biological matter
(bacteria, plankton, spores, cysts or other matter) and floc.

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

6 WASTE MANAGEMENT

Flocculation
 Flocculation, a gentle mixing stage, increases the particle size from submicroscopic
microfloc to visible suspended particles. Microfloc particles collide, causing them to
bond to produce larger, visible flocs called pinflocs.
 Chemicals used for flocculation include alum, lime, ferric chloride, ferrous sulphate
and polyelectrolytes. Poly electrolytes consist of long chain, water soluble polymers
such as polyacrylamides.
 The inorganic flocculants such as alum, upon mixing with water, the slightly higher
pH of water causes them to hydrolyse to form gelatinous precipitates of aluminium
hydroxide.

Chemical Treatment:
Chemical treatment transforms waste into less hazardous substances using such
techniques as pH neutralization, oxidation or reduction, and precipitation.
 These procedures involve the use of chemical reactions with the help of various
chemicals to convert hazardous waste into less hazardous substances.
 The chemical treatment produces useful by- products and some-times residual
effluent that are environmentally acceptable.
 Chemical reactions, either reduce the volume of the waste or convert the wastes to a
less hazardous form.

Chemical treatment process

 Solubility
 Neutralization
 Precipitation
 Coagulation and flocculation
 Oxidation and reduction
 Ion exchange methods

Solubility
 Hazardous waste may be organic and inorganic containing various chemical
elements and with various structural configurations.
 Water, known as the universal solvent, will dissolve many of these substances, while
others have only limited water solubility.
 Solubility of various salts inorganic and organic is utilized as a means of treatment of
hazardous waste when waste water treatment facilities are available and land fill
options are limited.

Neutralization
 Neutralization can be defined as the treatment of industrial waste so that it is neither
too acidic nor too alkaline for safe discharge
 There are several possible reasons that an industry neutralized its wastewater
 Neutralization of acids and alkaline waste streams is an example of the use of
chemical treatment to mitigate waste characterized as corrosive.
 Neutralization of an acid or base is easily determined by measuring its pH. Acid
based reactions are most common chemical process used in hazardous waste
treatment.
 Neutralization prior to land fill will be necessary so that inter reactions are avoided in

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

7 WASTE MANAGEMENT

land fill.

Precipitation:
 Often undesirable heavy metals are present in liquid and solid wastes which are in
slurry form. Simple precipitation.
 The usual method of removal of in organic heavy metals is chemical precipitation.
 Metals precipitate at varying pH levels depending on the metal ion, resulting in the
formation of an insoluble salt.
 Hence neutralization of an acidic waste stream can cause precipitation of heavy
metals.
 They hydroxides of heavy metals are usually insoluble so lime or caustic is
commonly used to precipitate them.

Coagulation and flocculation:

 Precipitation is greatly improved by adding coagulants. Most commonly used
coagulant is alum.
 Many poly electrolytes are used as coagulants. These coagulants neutralize the
charge of colloids in suspended condition thus by allowing them to settle rapidly

Theory of coagulation
 Coagulation is the destabilization of colloids by addition of chemicals that
neutralize the negative charges
 The chemicals are known as coagulants, usually higher valence
 Cationic salts
 Coagulation is essentially a chemical process
 Ionic layer compression
 Adsorption and charge neutralization
 Entrapment in a flocculent mass

Oxidation and Reduction:

• The chemical processes of oxidation and reduction can be used to convert toxic
pollutants to harmless or less toxic substances. Heavy metals wastes are subjected
to reduction process to precipitate to safer compounds of heavy metals.
• Example is Hexavalent chromium is precipitated into trivalent chromic hydroxide.
Similarly alkaline chlorination of cyanide neutralizes highly toxic cyanide wastes.

Ion exchange methods:

 Ion exchange is reversible exchange of ions between liquid and solid phases.
 Ions held by electrostatic forces to charged functional groups on the surface of
an insoluble solids are replaced by ions of similar charge in a solution Ion
exchange is stoichiometric, reversible and selective removal of dissolved ionic
species.

Biological Treatment:
 Biological treatment uses microorganisms to degrade organic compounds in the
waste stream
 Biological treatment is an effective, efficient and cost- effective way to treat
remove hazardous substances from wastewater through biological agents.

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

8 WASTE MANAGEMENT

 Hazardous waste materials are toxic to some of the microorganism. But a

substance, which is toxic to one group of organism, may act as valuable source
of food for another group.
 Bio-treatment is required in ideal conditions for better growth of bioagents and
hence is a limitation factor also.
 These involve the use of microorganisms under optimised conditions to
mineralise hazardous organic substances e.g. the use of pseudomonas under
aerobic conditions break down phenols.

Biological treatment process

 Bioremediation
 Metal uptake through plant species
 Composting
 Bacterial culture

Bioremediation
 Bioremediation is a process that treats a polluted area either by altering
environmental conditions to stimulate growth of microorganisms or through
natural microorganism activity, resulting in the degradation of the target
pollutants.
 Broad categories of bioremediation include biostimulation, bioaugmentation, and
natural recovery (natural attenuation).
 Bioremediation is either done on the contaminated site (in situ) or after the
removal of contaminated soils at another more controlled site (ex situ).
 One of their concerns is that the toxic chemicals would lead to the
microbe's gene degradation, which would then be passed on to other
harmful bacteria, creating more issues, if the pathogens evolve the ability to
feed off of pollutants.

Thermal Treatment:
These are the treatment processes which involve the application of heat to convert the
waste into less hazardous forms. It also reduces the volume and allows opportunities
for the recovery of energy from the waste
.
Incineration
 In incineration, in general, waste is destroyed or reduced to CO 2 , H2O and other
inorganic substances and these substances are harmless. The only limitation
with this treatment process is generation of effluent or emission which is rather
secondary pollution.
 Incineration is the controlled combustion process which can be used to degrade
organic substances.
 In practice, complete combustion is difficult if not impossible to achieve but for
hazardous waste 99.99% or greater destruction or removal is required for the
process to be generally acceptable.

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

9 WASTE MANAGEMENT

High temperature Incineration

POLLUTION PREVENTION AND WASTE MINIMISATION

Management support and employee participation: A clear commitment by management
(through policy, communications and resources) for waste minimisation and pollution
prevention is essential to earn the dedication of all employees. For this to happen, a
formal policy statement must be drafted and adopted. The purpose of this statement is to
reflect commitment and attitude towards protecting the environment, minimising or
eliminating waste and reusing or recycling materials by the laboratories, departments and
industries. Creative, progressive and responsible leadership will serve to develop an
environmental policy. However, the total employee workforce will need to be involved to
realise the fruits of the planning.

Training: As with any activity, it is important for management to train employees so that
they will have an understanding of what is expected of them and why they are being
asked to change the way things are done.

Waste audits: A programme of waste audits at the departmental level will provide a
systematic and periodic survey of the industries designed to identify areas of potential
waste reduction. The audit programme includes the identification of hazardous wastes
and their sources, prioritization of various waste reduction actions to be undertaken,
evaluation of some technically, economically and ecologically feasible approaches to
waste minimisation and pollution prevention, development of an economic comparison of
waste minimisation and pollution prevention options and evaluation of their results.

Good operating practices: These practices involve the procedural or organisational

aspects of industry, research or teaching activities and, in some areas, changes in
operating practices, in order to reduce the amount of waste generated. These practices

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

10 WASTE MANAGEMENT

would include, at a minimum, material handling improvements, scheduling improvements,

spill and leak prevention, preventive maintenance, corrective maintenance,
material/waste tracking or inventory control and waste stream segregation, according to
the toxicity, type of contaminant and physical state.

Material substitution practices: The purpose of these practices is to find substitute

materials, which are less hazardous than those currently utilised and which result in the
generation of waste in smaller quantities and/or of less toxicity.

Technological modification practices: These practices should be oriented towards

process and equipment modifications to reduce waste generation. These can range from
changes that can be implemented in a matter of days at low cost to the replacement of
process equipment involving large capital expenditures.

Recycling options: These options are characterised as use/reuse and resource recovery
techniques. Use and reuse practices involve the return of a waste material either to the
originating process or to another process as a substitute for an input material.
Reclamation practices tender a waste to another company.

Surplus chemical waste exchange options: Inter- and intra-department chemical

exchange is to be implemented and encouraged by employers/employees. Material
exchanges not only reduce wastes but also save money – both are important
considerations, during times of fiscal crisis.

E-waste recycling process flowchart

Collection
The first stage in the recycling process for e-waste is the collection of electronic

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

11 WASTE MANAGEMENT

products through recycling bins, collection locations, take-back programs, or on-

demand collection services. The mixed e-waste is then taken to
specialized electronics recyclers. Best practice dictates that e-waste should be separated
by type at this stage of the process, which is why many collection sites will have different
bins or boxes for different items. This is especially important for e-waste containing
batteries, which require special treatment and can be very damaging if mixed with other
waste.

Step Two — Storage

While safe storage may not appear critical, it can prove very important. For example, the
glass screens of Cathode Ray Tubes (CRT) TVs and monitors are highly contaminated by
lead. In the past, they were recycled into new computer monitors, but the growth of new
technology and subsequent decline in demand for CRT products means much of this
glass is now simply being stored indefinitely.

Step Three — Manual Sorting, Dismantling, Shredding

E-waste then goes through the initial stage of manual sorting, where various items (such
as batteries and bulbs) are removed for their own processing. This is the stage at which
some items may also be manually dismantled for components, reuse, or the recovery
of valuable materials. E-waste is then shredded into small pieces allowing for accurate
sorting of materials, a key part of the process. Most electronics are a mix of materials,
and breaking items down into pieces that measure just a few centimeters means they can
be separated mechanically.

Step Four — Mechanical Separation

The mechanical separation of the different materials actually consists of several
processes one after the other. The two key steps are magnetic separation and water
separation.

Magnetic Separation
The shredded e-waste is passed under a giant magnet, which is able to pull ferrous
metals such as iron and steel from the mix of waste. In addition to this, an eddy
current may also be used, separating the nonferrous metals. These materials can then be
diverted to dedicated recycling plants for smelting. Other materials such as metal-
embedded plastic and circuit boards are also separated at this stage.

Water Separation
With a solid waste stream that now consists mainly of plastic and glass, water is used to
separate the materials, further purifying for the separation of different plastics as well as
hand-sorting obvious contaminants.

Step Five: Recovery

The materials, now separated, are prepared for sale and reuse. For some materials, such
as plastic or steel, this means joining another recycling stream. Others may be processed
onsite and sold directly alongside usable components separated in the early stages.

The Recycling Process for Batteries

Upon arrival at a site, batteries are sorted by chemistry—lead-acid, nickel-cadmium,

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

12 WASTE MANAGEMENT

nickel- metal-hydride, and lithium-ion. Combustible materials, such as plastic casings and
insulation, are burned off, with a scrubber being used to capture polluting particles and
gasses created during the incineration process.

The emptied metal cells are then chopped into pieces and heated until the metal liquefies,
and non-metal components burn and gather on the top as a substance known as slag,
which is scraped from the surface. At this point, some centers send unprocessed metal to
specialized recycling plants. Other plants collect the metals during the liquification
process since they settle in layers according to density. Cadmium vaporizes during this
process and is collected through a condensation process.

The Recycling Process for Cathode Ray Tubes

Cathode Ray Tubes are considered one of the most troublesome types of waste to
recycle. While many of their components can be broken down, they can contain as
much as four pounds of lead per monitor/TV. This represents a significant threat, and the
glass is so contaminated by this lead that it can’t be added to normal glass recycling
streams. While this outdated technology might not seem like a problem going forward,
there remains a huge issue regarding recycling old item .

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM

13 WASTE MANAGEMENT

RAKSHITHA R, Department of Civil Engineering, MYCEM