SUSTAINABLE WASTE MANAGEMENT

Sustainable Waste Management



Sustainable Waste Management

Waste Management

Introduction

Waste can be defined as unwanted material, or as material that the holder disposes of or intends to dispose. The distinction between wastes and resources depends on one's willingness and technical ability to reuse artifacts and materials. One person's waste can be another person's resources. Industrial mass manufacture and modern packaging have led to a dramatic and still ongoing boost in the variety and volume of the waste produced by households, industrial concerns, and other workplaces (Bolger, 1998, pp. 551-7). Such waste includes various categories of hazardous waste, such as anthropotoxic, ecotoxic, infectious, and radioactive waste.

Discussion

Waste management is often discussed in terms of a waste hierarchy that lists the major treatment methods in order of decreasing priority. One common variant of the hierarchy has six steps:

Dispose of the waste.

Reuse the artifact.

Recycle the material in the artifact.

Prevent the creation of future waste.

Minimize the volumes and the harmful properties of future waste.

Incinerate the waste, and use the heat to recover energy.

The waste hierarchy is not always applicable to hazardous waste. In the Third World, recycling often takes the form of scavenging. The waste pickers are poor, marginalized people, including children, with no or inadequate protection against toxic or infectious waste. When recycling involves serious occupational risks, it may be wrong to prefer recycling to final disposal.

In the United States, effort has been given to providing local communities with ample information regarding the release of hazardous materials into the environment. In 1986, Congress passed the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA). This Act establishes planning and reporting requirements for federal, state, and local governments; Indian tribes; and industry and requires the involvement of the local community. One of the centerpieces of the Act concerns preplanning for the accidental release of hazardous materials. Another centerpiece of EPCRA is the requirement that certain industrial facilities and operations annually report an estimate of what types of hazardous materials and how much of the stuff is stored on-site, treated on-site, and released to the environment (Crump, 1998, pp. 265-73). With this information the EPA maintains the National Toxics Release Inventory, or TRI. The EPCRA requirements and the additional sources information available (from discharge permits for waste water and air releases, for example) provide the public with a substantial amount of information to help communities plan for growth and environmental protection. The public can also better understand the potential for contact with and exposure to hazardous materials. (Rodgers, 2005)

Confronting Waste

Because solid and hazardous wastes may affect human health, waste management is a fundamental part of environmental public health. Waste management is best accomplished through a multitiered approach. The first tier is primary waste stream reduction. Materials recycling, substitution of materials, and changes in consumer habits, among other methods, can help industries, communities, and other groups achieve waste stream reduction. All sectors of a modern society, when approached with effective informational campaigns and incentives, can practice waste reduction (Crump, 1996, ...