The document discusses solid and hazardous waste management, detailing the components of the waste stream, various disposal methods, and strategies for reducing waste generation. It highlights the challenges of recycling, the significant amounts of hazardous waste produced by industries, and the consequences of improper waste disposal, particularly in underprivileged communities. The text also explores options for hazardous waste management and emphasizes the importance of reducing waste at the source for environmental health.

1. Solid and Hazardous Wastes
Prof. Dr. Ali El-Naqa
2023/2024
Hashemite University, Department of Water
Management & Environment

2. Chapter 13 - Topics
• Waste
• Waste-Disposal Methods
• Shrinking the Waste Stream
• Hazardous and Toxic Wastes

3. Learning Objectives
• identify the major components of the
waste stream, and describe how wastes
have been-and are being-disposed of in
North America and around the world.
• explain the differences between dumps,
sanitary landfills, and modern, secure
landfills.
• summarize the benefits, problems, and
potential of recycling and reusing
wastes.
• analyze some alternatives for reducing
the waste we generate.

4. Learning Objectives
• understand what hazardous and toxic wastes
are and how we dispose of them.
• evaluate the options for hazardous-waste
management.
• outline some ways we can destroy or
permanently store hazardous wastes.

5. Part 1: Waste
• Agricultural waste - about 50%
• Residues produced by mining and primary
metal processing - about 30%
• Industrial waste - 400 million metric tons/year
• Municipal waste - 180 million metric tons/year
The United States produces 11 billion tons of
solid waste each year.

6. Composition of U.S. Domestic Waste

7. Composition of Jordanian Domestic Waste

8. Waste Composition of Amman City

9. Composition of Jordanian Domestic Waste

10. Waste management

11. The Waste Stream
• Waste stream - The waste stream is the steady flow
of varied wastes that we all produce, from domestic
garbage and yard wastes to industrial, commercial,
and construction refuse. Many of the materials in our
waste stream would be valuable resources if they
were not mixed with other garbage.
• In spite of recent progress in recycling, many
recyclable materials end up in the trash.
• Problem: refuse mixing - recyclable and
nonrecyclable materials, hazardous and
nonhazardous materials

12. The Waste Stream
• Municipal solid waste, the garbage we produce in our
houses, offices, and cities, accounts for a small
percentage of total waste by weight, but it is one of our
most important challenges in waste management.
• Municipal solid waste is hard to reuse and recycle
because it contains many different kinds of materials, yet
it amounts to about 250 million metric tons per year in
the United States

13. WHAT WASTE DO WE PRODUCE?

14. Part 2: Waste Disposal Methods

15. • Predominant method
of waste disposal in
developing countries
• Illegal dumping
• Groundwater
contamination
Open Dumps

16. Sanitary Landfills
• More than 1,200 of the 1,500 existing landfills in
the U.S. have closed.
• Many major cities must export their trash.

17. “Garbage Imperialism”
• Although most industrialized nations in the world have
agreed to stop shipping hazardous and toxic waste to
less developed countries, the practice still continues.
• Within rich nations, poor neighborhoods and minority
populations are more likely to be the recipients of
LULUs.(Locally Unwanted Land Uses. )
• These are facilities or land uses that, while necessary
or beneficial to society as a whole, are considered
undesirable by the communities in which they are
located due to their potential negative impacts.
Examples of LULUs include: Landfills, Power plants,
Industrial facilities, Waste treatment plants

18. Incineration and Resource Recovery
• Incineration - burning refuse
• Energy recovery - heat derived from
incineration is a useful resource
• Refuse-derived fuel: RDF is produced by processing
municipal solid waste to remove non-combustible materials. The
remaining combustible materials are then used as a fuel source, often in
industrial furnaces or power plants.
• Mass burn - greater problems with air pollution
• Residual ash - toxic components - dioxins

19. Incineration
• Can burn unseparated trash or separate trash that is
free of non combustibles such as glass or metal
• Heat used to produce steam for energy use, usually
electricity
• Became popular in the 1970’s during the oil crises
• Generation of toxic air pollutants was a problem
• Separating trash before burning helps
• In 1996, about 156 incinerators were operating in the
US (about 15.5% of solid waste output)
• Much higher in Europe, Japan, Scandanavia

20. Mass-Burn Garbage
Incinerator
Energy Recovery: Heat from waste combustion is converted into electricity or heating energy,
enhancing resource efficiency.
Pollution Control: Advanced systems like the electrostatic precipitator and bag house ensure
reduced emissions
Residual Waste Management: Ash and other residues are managed to minimize
environmental harm.

21. Municipal
Waste, 1995

22. Part 3: Shrinking the
Waste Stream
• Reusing vs. recycling
• Recycling successes
• Problems: fluctuating
market prices,
contamination
Recycling

23. Recycling Benefits, Incentives
• Recycling saves money, energy, raw
materials, and land space, while also
reducing pollution.
• Recycling encourages individual awareness
and responsibility.
• Japan - probably the most successful
recycling program in the world
• Creating incentives for recycling - public
policies, consumer demand

25. Source Separation in the Kitchen

26. U.S. Recycled Materials - 1994

27. Composting
• Compost can be mixed with sewage sludge
• bacterial decomposition releases heat and
kills any pathogenic bacteria present
• then it can be used on gardens, farmland, etc
• more nutrients in this than kitchen compost

28. Problems with composting
• Farmers don’t like the material because it is
low in nitrogen and phosphorus
• removing non-organic material from the waste
stream is costly
• land is needed, needs to be away from
people because of odor and insects

29. Composting

30. Composting

31. Demanufacturing
• De-manufacturing - the disassembly and recycling
of obsolete consumer products
• Refrigerators and air conditioners - CFCs
• Computers and other electronics - both toxic and
valuable metals
• Problem: electronics that are turned in for recycling in
the U.S. are sometimes dumped in developing
countries
• Discarded electronics, or e-waste, is one of the
greatest sources of toxic material currently going to
developing countries. There are at least 2 billion
television sets and personal computers in use
globally.

32. A Chinese woman breaks up e-waste to extract valuable metals (a). This kind of
unprotected demanufacturing is hazardous to workers and the
environment, but production of e-waste is rising in both developed and developing areas (b).
Most waste will be produced in developing areas after about 2015.
SOURCE: Modified from Yu et al., 2010, Environmental Science and Technology

33. Reuse
• Better than recycling
or composting
• Salvage from old
houses
• Glass and plastic
bottles
• Large national
companies favor
recycling over reuse.

34. Producing Less Waste
• The best way to reduce our waste stream
• Excess packaging of food and consumer
products is one of our greatest sources of
unnecessary waste.
• Photodegradable plastics - break down when
exposed to UV rays
• Biodegradable plastics - can be decomposed
by microorganisms
• Problems with photodegradable and
biodegradable plastics

35. The “Three R’s”
Reduce
Reuse
Recycle

36. Part 4: Hazardous and Toxic
Wastes
• What is hazardous waste?
• U.S. industries generate about about 265 million
metric tons of officially classified toxic wastes each
year.
• Chemical and petroleum industries - biggest sources
of toxins
• Hazardous waste is any discarded material, liquid or
solid that contains substances known to be 1)fatal to
humans or laboratory animals 2) toxic carcinogenic,
mutagenic or teratogenic to human or other life
forms, 3)ignitable with a flash point less than 60C°,
4)corrosive, 5) explosive or highly reactive

37. Hazardous
Waste Producers -
United States

38. Hazardous Wastes
• Pumped into deep wells, sewage treatment
centers or directly into lakes, ocean, and
rivers
• Many, many contaminated sites exist now
because of poor management of hazardous
wastes
• EPA has about 1,200 sites on the top of its
list for clean-up (MANY more sites exist)

39. Disposal of Hazardous Waste
• Secured landfills
• warehouses
• deep geologic salt beds
• deep injection wells
• landfills and wells are the preferred methods

40. Disposal
• Secured Landfills:
– most popular option
– impermeable clay liners, synthetic liners,
monitoring wells
– drain systems gathering liquids, detoxify
– careful siting of the landfills
– grading and compaction of soil over the
site minimizes infiltration, reducing
leaching
– what about cracks and earthquakes

42. Disposal
• Deep Injection Wells:
– 85% of HW is highly diluted with water
– Great amounts of toxic water
– Inject water into the earth’s crust between
layers of impermeable rock
– in theory, remains there forever
– but can migrate through unexpected fissures
in the rock and contaminate aquifers
– cracks in well casing, earthquakes

43. Hazardous Waste Disposal
• Resource Conservation and Recovery Act
(RCRA)
• Comprehensive Environmental Response,
Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA or
Superfund Act)
• Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization
Act (SARA) - Toxic Release Inventory

44. Tracking Toxic and Hazardous Wastes from cradle to grave

45. Superfund Sites
Superfund Sites refer to locations in the United States designated by the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) under the Comprehensive Environmental Response,
Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980. These are areas contaminated by
hazardous waste, posing risks to human health and the environment.

46. National Priority List (NPL)
• EPA estimate: 36,000 seriously contaminated
sites in the U.S.
• General Accounting Office (GAO) estimate:
400,000 seriously contaminated sites
• National Priority List (NPL) sites - waste sites
that are especially hazardous to human health or
environmental quality for cleanup with financing
from Superfund.
• How clean is clean?
• Brownfields - liability risks discourage
redevelopment

47. Environmental Justice

48. Options for Hazardous Waste
Management
• Produce less waste
• Physical treatments
• Incineration
• Chemical processing
• Permanent retrievable storage
• Secure landfills
• Bioremediation

49. Options for Hazardous Waste
Management
• Produce Less Waste As with other wastes, the safest
and least expensive way to avoid hazardous waste
problems is to avoid creating the wastes in the first place.
• Convert to Less Hazardous Substances Several
processes are available to make hazardous materials
less toxic. Physical treatments tie up or isolate
substances
• Permanent retrievable storage involves placing waste
storage containers in a secure place such as a salt mine
or bedrock cavern, where they can be inspected
periodically and retrieved if necessary.

50. Options for Hazardous Waste
Management
• Store Permanently Inevitably, there are some materials
we can’t destroy, make into something else, or otherwise
eliminate. We will have to store them out of harm’s way
(fig. 14.21).
• Permanent retrievable storage involves placing waste
storage containers in a secure place such as a salt mine
or bedrock cavern,
• Secure landfills are the most popular solutions for
hazardous waste disposal, however. Although many
landfills have been environmental disasters, newer
techniques make it possible to create safe, secure,
modern landfills that can contain many hazardous
wastes.

51. Secure Landfills
A secure landfill has a thick plastic liner, and two or more layers of compacted clay and a gravel
bed, from which drains collect material leaching from the landfill. Testing wells allow monitoring
for escaping contaminants or combustible methane.

52. Options for Hazardous Waste
Management
• Bioremediation, or biological waste treatment, offer
promising prospects for business development as well as
for environmental health and saving taxpayer money.
• A promising alternative to these methods involves
bioremediation. Microscopic bacteria and fungi can
absorb, accumulate, and detoxify a remarkable variety of
toxic compounds. They can also accumulate heavy
metals, and some have been developed that can
metabolize (break down) PCBs. Aquatic plants such as
water hyacinths and cattails can also be used to purify
contaminated effluent.