Go back       13 Glossary

Solid and Hazard Waste

Solid wastes are only raw materials we're too stupid to use. ARTHUR C. CLARKE

13-1  WASTING RESOURCES

What Is Solid Waste, and How Much Is Produced?
The United States, with only 4,6% of the world's population, produces about 33% of the world's solid waste: any unwanted or discarded material that is not a liquid or a gas. About 98.5% of this solid waste comes from (1) mining, (2) oil and natural gas production, (3) agriculture (Figure 9-17, p. 203), (4) sewage sludge, and (5) industrial activities used to produce goods and services for consumers (Figure 13-1).

The remaining 1.5% of solid waste produced in the United States is municipal solid waste (MSW) from homes and businesses in or near urban areas. The amount of MSW, often called garbage, currently produced in the United States each year comes to about 200 million metric tons (440 billion pounds )-almost twice as much as in 1970. Each year this is enough waste to fill a bumper-to-bumper convoy of garbage trucks encircling the globe almost eight times.

The annual MSW amounts to an average of 680 kilograms (1,500 pounds) per person in the United States, the world's highest per capita solid waste production and many times the rate in developing countries. About 54% of this MSW is dumped in landfills, 30% is recycled or composted, and 16% is burned in incinerators.

What Does It Mean to Live in a High-Waste Society? Here are a few of the solid wastes U.S. consumers throwaway:

. Enough aluminum to rebuild the country's entire commercial airline fleet every 3 months

. Enough tires each year to encircle the planet almost three times

. About 18 billion disposable diapers per year, which if linked end to end would reach to the moon and back seven times

. About 2 billion disposable razors, 30 million cell phones, 18 million computers, and 8 million television sets each year

. Some 8.6 million metric tons (17 billion pounds) of polystyrene peanuts per year used to protect shipped items

Figure 13.1 Sources of the estimated 11 billion metric tons (12 billion tons) of solid waste produced each year in the United States. Mining, agricultural, and industrial activities produce 55 times as much solid waste as household activities. (Data from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Bureau of Mines)

. Used carpet that would cover 7,800 square kilometers (3,000 square miles)-more than enough to carpet the state of Delaware

. About 1.7 billion metric tons (3.7 trillion pounds) of construction waste per year-an average of 6 metric tons (12,800 pounds) per person

. About 2.5 million nonreturnable plastic bottles every hour

. About 670,000 metric tons (1.5 billion pounds) of edible food per year

. Enough office paper to build a 3.5-meter (13-foot) high wall from New York City to San Francisco, California

. Some 186 billion pieces of junk mail (an average of 646 per American) each year, about 45% of which are thrown in the trash unopened

This is only part of the 1.5% of all solid waste labeled "municipal" in Figure 13-1.

What Is Hazardous Waste, and How Much Is Produced?
In the United States, hazardous waste is legally defined as any discarded solid or liquid material that (1) contains one or more of 39 toxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic, or teratogenic compounds (p. 222) at levels that exceed established limits (including many solvents, pesticides, and paint strippers), (2) catches fire easily (gasoline, paints, and solvents), (3) is reactive or unstable enough to explode or release toxic fumes (acids, bases, ammonia, chlorine bleach), or (4) is capable of corroding metal containers such as tanks, drums, and barrels (industrial cleaning agents and oven and drain cleaners).

This official definition of hazardous wastes (mandated by Congress) does not include the following materials: (1) radioactive wastes (p. 126), (2) hazardous and toxic materials discarded by households (Table 13-1), (3) mining wastes, (4) oil- and gas-drilling wastes (routinely discharged into surface waters or dumped into unlined pits and landfills), (5) liquid waste containing organic hydrocarbon compounds (80% of all liquid hazardous waste), (6) cement kiln dust, produced when liquid hazardous wastes are burned in a cement kiln, and (7) wastes from the thousands of small businesses and factories that generate less than 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of hazardous waste per month.

As a result, hazardous waste laws do not regulate 95% of the country's hazardous waste. In most other countries, especially developing countries, even less, if any, of the hazardous waste is regulated.

Including all categories, the EPA estimates that at least 5.5 billion metric tons (12 trillion pounds) of hazardous waste are produced each year in the United States-an average of 19 metric tons (42,000 pounds) per person. This amounts to about 75% of the world's hazardous waste.

13-2 PRODUCING LESS WASTE AND POLLUTION

What Are Our Options?
Here are two ways to deal with the solid and hazardous waste we create:

. Waste management: a high-waste approach (Figure 4-6, p. 71) that views waste production as an unavoidable product of economic growth. It attempts to manage the resulting wastes in ways that reduce environmental harm, mostly by (1) burying them, (2) burning them, or (3) shipping them off to another state or country. In effect, it transfers solid and hazardous waste from one part of the environment to another.

. Waste and pollution prevention: a low-waste approach that recognizes there is no "away" and views most solid and hazardous waste either (1) as potential resources (that we should be recycling, composting, or reusing) or (2) as harmful substances that we should not be using in the first place (Figure 4-7, p. 72, and Figures 13-2 and 13-3). This approach focuses on discouraging waste production and encouraging waste reduction and prevention.

Scientists estimate that in a low-waste society, 60-80% of the solid and hazardous waste produced could be eliminated through reduction, reuse, recycling (including composting), and redesign of manufacturing processes and buildings. Currently, the order of priorities shown in Figures 13-2 and 13-3 for dealing with solid and hazardous wastes is reversed in the United States (and in most other countries).

Solutions: How Can We Reduce Waste and Pollution?
Here are some ways to reduce resource use, waste, and pollution:

. Consume less. Before buying anything, ask questions such as (1) Do I really need this? (2) Can I buy it secondhand? and (3) Can I borrow or lease it?

. Redesign manufacturing processes and products to use less material and energy (Solutions, p. 306).

. Redesign manufacturing processes to produce less waste and pollution. Most toxic organic solvents can be recycled within plants or replaced with water-;based or citrusbased solvents (Individuals Matter, p. 253). Hydrogen peroxide can be used instead of toxic chlorine to bleach paper and other materials. A CO2-based process can replace dry cleaning with toxic organic solvents such as perchloroethylene (PERC).

. Develop products that are easy to repair, reuse, remanufacture, compost, or recycle. Xerox's latest photocopier, with every part reusable or recyclable for easy remanufacturing, should eventually save the company $1 billion in manufacturing costs.

. Design products to last longer. Today's tires have an average life of 97,000 kilometers (60,000 miles), but researchers believe this use could be extended to at least 160,000 kilometers (100,000 miles).

. Eliminate or reduce unnecessary packaging. Here are some key questions designers, manufacturers, and consumers should ask about packaging: (1) Is it necessary?

harmful air pollutants or a toxic ash?
(8) Can it be buried and decomposed in a landfill without producing chemicals that can contaminate groundwater?

. Use trash taxes to reduce waste, and use the revenues to reduce taxes on income and wealth, as a number of European countries have done. A related pay-as-you-throw system reduces solid waste and encourages recycling by basing garbage collection charges on the amount of waste a household or business generates for disposal.

Figure 13-2 Solutions: priorities suggested by prominent scientists for dealing with material use and solid waste. To date, these waste-reduction priorities have not been followed in the United States (and in most other countries). Instead, most efforts are devoted to waste management (bury it or burn it). (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. National Academy of Sciences)

Figure 13-3 Solutions: priorities suggested by prominent scientists for dealing with hazardous J waste. To date, these priorities have not been followed in the United States (and in most other'countries). (U.S. National Academy of Sciences)

During the last few decades, a design revolution has allowed businesses to use less material and energy per unit of goods and services. This has been done mostly by (1) finding substitutes for products that use less material and (2) redesigning or improving products so they take less material and energy to produce.

Paper documents such as product catalogs, phone directories, technical reference manuals, and parts directories can be accessed on CD-ROMs, DVD-ROMs, or at various Internet sites, saving millions of dollars and tons of paper. All the phone books in the United States can be put on about three CDROMs, and a single DVD-ROM could hold all the world's phone numbers.

A skyscraper built today includes about 35% less steel than the same building built in the 1960s because of the use of lighter weight but higher strength steel. Use of such steel and replacement of many steel parts with lightweight plastics and composite materials has (1) reduced the weight of cars by about 25% without compromising performance and safety, (2) increased fuel efficiency, and (3) reduced the average weight per unit of appliances such as stoves, washers, dryers, air conditioners, TV sets, and computers.

Since the mid-1970s, (1) the thickness of plastic grocery bags has been reduced by 70% without sacrificing strength, (2) plastic milk jugs weigh 40% less, (3) aluminum drink cans contain one-third less aluminum, (4) steel cans are 60% lighter, (5) disposable diapers contain 50% less paper pulp, and (6) plastic frozen food bags weigh 89% less.

These improvements in resource productivity are important, but according to some analysts they can be greatly increased through a new resource productivity revolution. In their 1999 book Natural Capitalism, Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, and Hunter Lovins contend we have the knowledge and technology to greatly increase resource productivity by getting 75-90% more work or service from each unit of material resources we use.

To these analysts, the only major impediments to such an economic and ecological revolution are laws, policies, taxes, and subsidies that (1) continue to reward inefficient resource use and (2) fail to reward efficient resource use.

Critical Thinking
Do you believe it is possible to decrease resource waste by 75-90% within the next 20 years? Explain. What might be some disadvantages of making such a shift? Do you believe such disadvantages outweigh the advantages? Explain.

13-3 SOLUTIONS: CLEANER PRODUCTION AND SELLING SERVICES INSTEAD OF THINGS

What Is the Ecoindustrial Revolution, and What Are Its Benefits?
Some analysts urge us to bring about an ecoindustrial revolution over the next 50 years as a way to help achieve industrial, economic, and environmental sustainability. The goals of this emerging concept of cleaner production, or industrial ecology, are to redesign all industrial products and processes and integrate them into (1) essentially closed systems of cyclical material flows (Figure 4-7, p. 72) or (2) networks in which the wastes of one manufacturer become raw materials for another.

In effect, companies producing goods would (1) mimic natural chemical cycles (Section 2-5, p. 34) and (2) interact in complex resource exchange webs similar to food webs (Figure 2-20, p. 33) in natural ecosystems. A prototype of this industrial ecosystem concept exists in Kalundborg, Denmark, where a number of businesses and nearby homes are working together to save money by exchanging and converting their wastes into resources for one another (Figure 13-4). Today more than 25 eco-industrial parks similar to the one in Kalundborg are being developed around the world.

In addition to eliminating most waste and pollution, these industrial forms of biomimicry provide economic benefits to businesses by

. Reducing the costs of controlling pollution and complying with pollution regulations.

. Improving the health and safety of workers by reducing exposure to toxic and hazardous material (and thus reducing company health-care insurance costs).

. Reducing future legal liability for toxic and hazardous wastes.

. Stimulating companies to come up with new, environmentally beneficial chemicals, processes, and products that can be sold worldwide.

. Giving companies a better image among consumers based on results rather than on public relations campaigns.

Figure 13-4 Industrial ecosystem in Kalundborg, Denmark, reduces waste production by mimicking a natural food web (Figure 2-20, p. 33) and having the wastes of one business become the raw materials for another business.

In 1975, the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company (3M), which makes 60,000 different products in 100 manufacturing plants, began a Pollution Prevention Pays (3P) program. It (1) redesigned equipment and processes, (2) used fewer hazardous raw materials, (3) identified hazardous chemical outputs (and recycled or sold them as raw materials to other companies), and (4) began making more nonpolluting products.

By 1998, (1) 3M's overall waste production was down by one-third, (2) its air pollutant emissions per unit of production were reduced by 70%, and (3) the company had saved more than $750 million in waste disposal and material costs. Since 1990, a growing number of companies have adopted similar pollution prevention programs.

What Is a Service Flow Economy, and What Are Its Advantages?
In the mid-1980s, German chemist Michael Braungart and Swiss industry analyst Walter Stahel independently proposed a new economic model that would provide profits while greatly reducing resource use and waste. Their idea involves shifting from our current material flow economy (Figure 4-6, p. 71) to a service flow economy over the next few decades. Instead of buying most goods outright, customers would lease or rent the services such goods provide.

With such a service flow or product stewardship economy, a product produced by a manufacturer remains as an asset that yields more profit if it (1) uses the minimum amount of materials, (2) lasts as long as possible, (3) is easy to maintain, repair, remanufacture, reuse, or recycle, and (4) provides customers with the services they want instead of trying to keep selling. them newer models of outmoded products.

This economic shift is under way:

. Since 1992, the Xerox Corporation has been leasing most of its copy machines as part of its mission to provide document services instead of selling photocopiers. When the service contract expires, Xerox takes the machine back for reuse or remanufacture and has a goal of sending no material to landfills or incinerators. To save money, machines are designed to (1) use recycled paper, (2) have few parts, (3) be energy efficient, and (4) emit as little noise, heat, ozone, and copier chemicals as possible.

Ray Anderson is CEO of Interface, a company based in Atlanta, Georgia, that makes carpet tiles. The company is the world's largest commercial carpet manufacturer with 26 factories in 6 countries, customers in 110 countries, and more than $1 billion in annual sales.

Anderson changed the way he viewed the world and his business after reading Paul Hawken's book The Ecology of Commerce. In 1994, he announced plans to develop the nation's first totally sustainable green corporation.

He has implemented hundreds of projects with the goals of (1) zero waste, (2) greatly reduced energy use, and (3) eventually zero use of fossil fuels by relying on renewable solar energy. By 1999, the company had reduced resource waste by almost 30% and reduced energy waste enough to save $100 million. One of Interface's factories in California runs on solar cells to produce the world's first solarmade carpet.

To achieve the goal of zero waste, Anderson plans to stop selling carpet and lease it as a way to control recycling. For a monthly fee, the company will (1) install, clean, and inspect the carpet on a monthly basis, (2) repair worn carpet tiles overnight, and (3) recycle worn-out tiles into new carpeting. As Anderson puts it, "We want to harvest yesterday's carpets and recycle them with zero scrap going to the landfill and zero emissions into the ecosystem-and run the whole thing on sunlight."

Du Pont and several other chemical companies have developed processes to remove the nylon and plastic PVC fibers in carpet and recycle it into other lower-quality use products (downcycling).

Interface has gone further and developed a new polymer material, called Solenium, that (1) when worn out can be completely recycled back into new carpet tiles (more desirable closed-loop recycling), (2) does not mildew, (3) is highly stain resistant, and (4) is easily cleaned with water. Making this material takes fewer steps, uses up to 40% less raw material and energy, and produces 99.7% less waste than making normal carpet, and the material lasts about four times longer than conventionalcarpet.

The company also has plans to install and lease a raised-floor system that goes beneath its carpet tiles and integrate this with cooling and heating services provided by other service companies.

Anderson is one of a growing number of business leaders committed to finding more economically and ecologically sustainable ways to do business while still making a profit for stockholders. Between 1993 and 1998, the company's revenues doubled and profits tripled, mostly because the company saved $130 million in material costs with an investment of less than $40 million. Andersen says he is having a blast.

. Ray Anderson, CEO of a large carpet tile company, plans to lease rather than sell carpet (Individuals Matter, above).

. For years, 160 firms, called chauffagistes, have been providing 10 million buildings in metropolitan France with heat. These firms provide warmth services by contracting to keep a client's space within a specified temperature during certain hours at a designated cost.

. Carrier, the world's leading maker of air-conditioning equipment, now sells leases to provide its customers with cooling services. Carrier also teams up with other service providers to install super-efficient windows and more efficient lighting and make other energy-efficiency upgrades that reduce the cooling needs of its customers. Carrier makes money by having to install less or even no air-conditioning equipment to provide cooling services for its customers.

. Dow and several other chemical companies are doing a booming business in leasing organic solvents (mostly used to remove grease from surfaces), photographic developing chemicals, and dyes and pigments. In this chemical service business, the company (1) delivers the chemicals, (2) helps the client set up a recovery system, (3) takes away the recovered chemicals, and (4) delivers new chemicals as needed.

What Are the Advantages of Refillable Containers?
The good news is that reuse is a form of waste reduction that (1) extends resource supplies, (2) keeps high-quality matter resources from being reduced to low-matter-quality waste, and (3) reduces energy use and pollution even more than recycling.

The bad news is we have increasingly substituted (1) throwaway tissues for reusable handkerchiefs, (2) disposable paper towels and napkins for reusable cloth ones, (3) throwaway paper plates and cups and plastic utensils for reusable plates, cups, and silverware, and (4) throwaway beverage containers for refillable ones.

Two examples of reuse are refillable glass beverage bottles and refillable soft drink bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic. Unlike throw

away and recyclable cans and bottles, refillable beverage bottles create local jobs related to their collection and refilling. Moreover, studies by Coca-Cola and PepsiCo of Canada show that their soft drinks in 0.5liter (16-ounce) bottles cost one-third less in refillable bottles than in throwaway bottles.

Denmark and Canada's Prince Edward Island have led the way by banning all beverage containers that cannot be reused. To encourage use of refillable glass bottles, Ecuador has a refundable beverage container deposit fee 'that is 50% of the cost of the drink. In Finland, 95% of the soft drink, beer, wine, and spirits containers are refillable, and in Germany, 73% are refillable.

Here are other examples of reusable items:

. Metal or plastic lunch boxes.

. Plastic containers for storing lunch box items and refrigerator leftovers instead of using throwaway plastic wrap and aluminum foil.

. Cloth shopping bags (Solutions, p. 310).

. Shipping pallets made of recycled plastic waste instead of throwaway wood pallets. In 1991, Toyota shifted entirely to reusable shipping containers. A similar move by the Xerox Corporation saves the company $2-5 million per year.

. Tool libraries (such as those in Berkeley, California, and Takoma Park, Maryland) where people can check out a variety of power and hand tools.

. e-paper, a flexible and cordless computer screen being developed by Xerox that (1) looks like a sheet of paper, (2) uses no energy for storing or viewing writing or images, and (3) can be electronically written and rewritten at least a million times, making it equivalent to more than a million sheets of paper.

What Are the Two Types of Recycling?
Recycling has a number of benefits to people and the environment (Figure 13-5). There are two types of recycling for materials such as glass, metals, paper, and plastics:

. Primary, or closed-loop, recycling, in which wastes discarded by consumers (postconsumer wastes) are recycled to produce new products of the same type (such as newspaper into newspaper and aluminum cans into aluminum cans). This reduces pollution and use of virgin resources and saves energy.

. Secondary, or downcycling, in which waste materials are converted into different and usually lower-quality products.

Environmentalists urge 11s not to be misled by labels claiming that paper and plastic bags or other items are recyclable. Just about anything is recyclable. What counts is whether (1) an item is actually recycled, ideally by primary recycling, (2) it is designed for recycling by not containing mixtures of materials that are difficult and expensive to separate, and (3) we complete the recycling loop by buying products using the maximum feasible content of postconsumer recycled materials.

Figure 13-5 Some benefits of recycling for people and the environment. Despite its many benefits, recycling is still an output approach that deals with wastes after they are produced instead of a way to reduce the overall flow of resources.

When you're offered a choice between plastic or paper bags for your groceries, which should you choose?
The answer is neither. Both are environmentally harmful, and the question of which is the more damaging has no clear-cut answer.

On the one hand, plastic bags degrade slowly in landfills and can harm wildlife if swallowed, and producing them pollutes the environment. On the other hand, producing the brown paper bags used in most supermarkets uses trees and pollutes the air and water. Overall, white or clear polyethylene plastic bags take less energy for manufacture and cause less damage to the environment than do paper bags not made mostly from recycled paper.

Instead of having to choose between paper and plastic bags, you can (1) bring your own reusable canvas or string containers to the store, or (2) save and reuse any paper or plastic bags you get. Reusing a paper or plastic bag just five times displaces the pollution caused by the manufacture of the bag. To encourage people to bring their own reusable bags, stores in the Netherlands charge for paper or plastic bags.

Critical Thinking

1. Apply similar reasoning to determine what kind of cup (plastic, paper, or reusable) you should use whenever possible. How could you solve the problem of getting coffee or other beverages at fast-food places and at workplaces?

2. Do you believe grocery stores should charge for paper or plastic bags and sell reusable bags to encourage reuse?
Explain. How would you implement such a policy in all major grocery stores to provide an even economic playing field for all consumers?

Case Study: Recycling Municipal Solid Waste in the United States
In 1999, about 30% of U.S. MSW was recycled or composted (Solutions, p. 312)-the highest rate of any industrialized country. These programs recycle (1) 98% of the steel used in cars, (2) 96% of car batteries, (3) 70% of lead, (4) 55% of aluminum cans (down from 62% in 1992), (5) 49% of wastepaper and paperboard, (6) 40% of yard waste, and (7) 27% of glass containers. Pilot studies in several U.S. communities show that 60-80% of all MSW could be recycled and composted.

Is Centralized Recycling of Mixed Solid Waste the Answer?
Large-scale recycling can be accomplished by collecting mixed urban waste and transporting it to centralized materials-recovery facilities (MRFs). There, machines shred and automatically separate the mixed waste to recover valuable materials for sale to manufacturers as raw materials (Figure 13-6). The remaining paper, plastics, and other combustible wastes are recycled or burned to produce steam or electricity to run the recovery plant or to sell to nearby industries or homes. Ash from the incinerator is buried in a landfill.

More than 225 MRFs operate in the United States. However, such plants (1) are expensive to build, operate, and maintain (which is why some have been shut down), (2) can emit toxic air pollutants if not operated properly, and (3) produce a toxic ash that must be disposed of safely. MRFs also must have a large input of garbage to make them financially successful. Thus their owners have a vested interest in increasing throughput of matter and energy resources to produce more trash, the reverse of what prominent scientists believe we should be doing (Figure 13-2).

Is Separating Solid Wastes for Recycling the Answer?
Many solid waste experts argue that it makes more sense economically and environmentally for households and businesses to keep trash separate in recyclable and reusable categories (such as glass, paper, metals, certain types of plastics, and compostable materials). Then compartmentalized city collection trucks, private haulers, or volunteer recycling organizations pick up the segregated wastes and sell them to scrap dealers, compost plants, and manufacturers. Another alternative (especially in less populated areas) is to establish a network of drop-off centers, buyback centers, and deposit refund programs in which people deliver and sell or donate separated recyclable materials.

This source separation approach (1) produces little air and water pollution, (2) has low startup costs and moderate operating costs, (3) saves more energy and provides more jobs per unit of material than MRFs, landfills, and incinerators, (4) yields cleaner and usually more valuable recyclables, and (5) educates people about the need for waste reduction, reuse, and recycling.

Figure 13.6 Schematic of a generalized materials-recovery facility (MRF) used to sort mixed wastes for recycling and burning to produce energy. Because such plants need high volumes of trash to be economical, they discourage reuse and waste reduction.

Case Study: How Much Wastepaper Is Being Recycled?
Paper (especially newspaper and cardboard) is one of the easiest materials to recycle. Recycling paper involves (1) removing its ink, glue, and coating and (2) reconverting it to pulp that is pressed again into new paper. The perception that recycled paper is weak, coarse, and flecked is no longer true. A variety of high-quality recycled papers are available to meet all types of printing demands at competitive prices (including the paper used in this book).

In 2000, the United States recycled about 49% of its wastepaper (up from 25% in 1989) and 70% of its corrugated cardboard containers. At least ten other countries recycle 50-97% of their wastepaper and paperboard, with a global recycling rate of 43%. Despite a 49% recycling rate, the amount of paper thrown away each year in the United States is more than all of the paper consumed in China (where the recycling rate is only 27%).

Recycling paper (1) does not involve cutting new trees, (2) saves energy because it takes 3 % less energy to produce the same weight of recycled paper as to make the paper from trees, (3) reduces air pollution from pulp mills by 74-95%, (4) lowers water pollution by 35%, (5) helps prevent groundwater contamination by toxic ink left after paper rots in landfills over a 30- to 60-year period, (6) conserves large quantities of water, (7) takes little or no bleaching because the fibers recycled from white paper have already been bleached, (8) can save landfill space, (9) creates five times more jobs than harvesting trees for pulp, and (10) can save money.

Chlorine and chlorine compounds used to bleach about 40% of the world's pulp for making paper are (1) corrosive to processing equipment, (2) hazardous for workers, (3) hard to recover and reuse, and (4) extremely harmful when released to the environment. A growing number of paper mills (mostly in Europe) are replacing chlorine-based bleaching chemicals with oxygen-based chemicals such as hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). Such processes (1) nearly eliminate the release of air pollutants (including highly toxic chlorinecontaining dioxin, p. 318), (2) use less water and energy, (3) allow reuse of the water many times, (4) reduce the treatment needed for water that is discharged, and (5) save money.

Buying recycled paper products can save trees and energy and reduce pollution, but it does not necessarily reduce solid waste. Only paper products made from postconsumer waste-waste intercepted on its way from consumer to the landfill or incinerator-does that.

Most recycled paper is made from preconsumer waste: scraps and cuttings recovered from paper and printing plants. Because paper manufacturers have always recycled this waste, it has never contributed to landfill problems. Now this paper is labeled "recycled" as a marketing ploy, giving the false impression that people who buy such products (often at higher prices) are helping reduce solid waste. Most so-called recycled paper has no more than 50% recycled fibers, with only 10% from postconsumer waste. Environmentalists propose that governments require companies to use labels (1) giving postconsumer recycled content and (2) indicating whether the paper was bleached with chlorine or by a chlorine-free process.

Composting biodegradable organic waste such as paper, food scraps, and lawn waste is a way to produce plant nutrients that can be recycled to the soil. Biodegradable wastes make up about 35% by weight of the MSW output in the United States and could be converted to compost.

However, only about 5% of the MSW in the United States is composted (compared to 17% in France and 10% in Switzerland). Some cities in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg, and Switzerland recover and compost more than 85% of their biodegradable wastes.

Individuals can compost such wastes in backyard bins or indoor containers. They can also be collected and composted in centralized community facilities, as is done in many western European countries.

The resulting compost can be used as (1) an organic soil fertilizer or conditioner, (2) topsoil, or (3) landfill cover. Compost also can be used to help restore eroded soil on hillsides and along highways, strip-mined land, overgrazed areas, and eroded cropland.

To be successful, a large scale composting program must (1) overcome siting problems (few people want to live near a giant compost pile or plant), (2) control odors, and (3) exclude toxic materials that can contaminate the compost and make it unsuitable for use as a fertilizer on crops and lawns.

Three ways to control or reduce odors for large-scale composting operations are (1) enclosing the facilities and filtering the air inside (but residents near large composting plants still complain of unacceptable odors), (2) creating municipal compost operations near existing landfills or at other isolated sites, and (3) decomposing biodegradable wastes in a closed metal container in which air is recirculated to give precise control of available oxygen and temperature (a technique that has been used successfully in the Netherlands for 20 years).

Critical Thinking
How would you increase the rate of composting of biodegradable wastes in your community?

Is It Feasible to Recycle Plastics?
Currently, only about 7% by weight of all plastic wastes and 10% of plastic containers in the United States are recycled, for the following reasons:

. Plastics are very difficult to isolate from other wastes because they (1) occur in so many different and often difficult-to-identify forms of resins, (2) sometimes consist of composites or laminated layers of different plastics, and (3) contain stabilizers and other chemicals that must be removed before recycling.

. Recovering individual plastic resins does not yield much material because only small amounts of any given resin are used per product.

. The price of oil is so low that the cost of virgin plastic resins (except for PET, used mostly in plastic drink bottles) is about 40% lower than that of recycled resins.

Thus mandating that plastic products contain a certain amount of recycled plastic resins is (1) unlikely to work and (2) could hinder the use of plastics in reducing the resource content and weight (Solutions, p. 306) of many widely used items such as plastic bags, bottles, and other containers.

Why Don't We Have More Reuse and Recycling?
The following three factors hinder recycling and reuse:

. Failure to include the harmful environmental and health costs of raw materials in the market prices of consumer items.

. More government tax breaks and subsidies for resource-extracting industries than for recycling and reuse industries.

. Lack of large steady markets for recycled materials. . Some critics have claimed that recycling costs more than it is worth (Pro/Con, below).

Analysts suggest overcoming these obstacles by

. Taxing virgin resources and phasing out subsidies for extracting virgin resources.

. Lowering or eliminating taxes on recycled materials based on postconsumer waste content.

. Providing subsidies for reuse and postconsumer waste recycling.

. Greatly increasing use of the pay-as-you-throw system.

. Encouraging or requiring government purchases of recycled products to help increase demand and lower prices.

. Viewing landfilling and incineration of solid wastes as last resorts to be used only for wastes that cannot be reused, composted, or recycled (Figure 13-2).

. Passing laws requiring companies to take back and recycle or reuse packaging discarded by consumers. Globally, at least 29 countries (including Japan and 20 European nations) have such "takeback" laws.

. Requiring manufacturers to take back and recycle or reuse appliances and motor vehicles at the end of their useful lives. This is required for car manufacturers and appliance makers in European Union countries and for major appliances in Japan.

. Requiring labels on all products listing preconsumer and postconsumer recycled content.

13-6 DETOXIFYING, BURNING, BURYING, AND EXPORTING WASTES

How Can Hazardous Waste Be Detoxified?
In Denmark, all hazardous and toxic waste from industries and households is delivered to 21 transfer stations throughout the country. All waste is then transferred to a large treatment facility. There about 75% of the waste is detoxified by biological and chemical methods and the rest is buried in a carefully designed and monitored landfill.

Some consider biological treatment of hazardous waste, or bioremediation, to be the wave of the future for cleaning up some types of toxic and hazardous waste. In this process, microorganisms (usually natural or genetically engineered bacteria) and enzymes help convert toxic or hazardous substances to harmless compounds.

Another biological way to treat hazardous wastes is phytoremediation, which involves using natural or genetically engineered plants to filter and remove contaminants. Selected plants have been identified as "pollution sponges" to help clean up soil and water contaminated with chemicals such as pesticides, organic solvents, radioactive metals, and toxic metals such as lead and mercury. .

Phytoremediation (1) is inexpensive, (2) does not involve heavy machinery that produces air pollution, and (3) can reduce the amount of material dumped in landfills. But (1) it is often slow (it can take several growing seasons to clean a site), (2) it is effective only at depths that plant roots can reach, and (3) in some cases animals may feed on pollutant-containing leaves.

Does recycling make economic sense?

The answer is yes and no, depending on different ways of looking at the economic and environmental benefits and costs of recycling. Critics contend that recycling

. Has become almost a religion that is above criticism regardless of how much it costs communities.

. Does not make sense if it costs more to recycle materials than to send them to a landfill or incinerator.

. Often is not needed to save landfill space because many areas in the United States are not running out of landfill space.

. May make economic sense for valuable and easy-to-recycle materials (such as aluminum, paper, and steel) but not for cheap or plentiful resources (such as glass from silica) and most plastics (which are expensive to recycle). For example, in 2002 New York City continued recycling paper and metals but stopped recycling plastics and glass.

However,  proponents argue that

. Recycling programs should not be judged on whether they pay for themselves any more than are conventional garbage disposal systems based on land burial or incineration. . The primary benefit of recycling. is not reducing the use of landfills and incinerators but the other important benefits it provides for people and the environment (Figure 13-5).

. Studies show the net economic, health, and environmental benefits of recycling (Figure 13-5) far outweigh the costs.

. The recycling industry is an important part of the U.S. economy that employs about 1.1 million people and has $236 billion in annual sales-much larger than either the mining or waste management and disposal industries.

. Programs like (1) a single pickup system (for both materials to be recycled and garbage that cannot be recycled), instead of a more expensive dual collection system, and (2) a pay-as-you-throw system tend to make money and have higher recycling rates.

Critical Thinking
Do you believe recycling programs should be set up and continued only if they make money? Explain.

Is Burning Solid and Hazardous Waste the Answer?
In the United States, about 16% of the mixed trash in municipal solid waste is combusted in about 170 mass-burn incinerators (Figure 13-7). About 80% of the hazardous waste is burned in 172 commercial incinerators, cement kilns, and lightweight aggregate kilns. The other 20% is combusted in industrial boilers and other types of industrial furnaces. Figure 13-8 lists the advantages and disadvantages of using incinerators to burn solid and hazardous waste.

Since 1985, using incineration for treating wastes in some parts of the world has decreased because of (1) high costs, (2) health threats from air pollution, and (3) intense citizen opposition. For example, (1) Sweden banned the construction of new incinerators in 1985, (2) Rhode Island and West Virginia banned solid waste incineration in 1992, (3) several solid waste incinerators in the United States have been shut down because of excessive costs and pollution and by 2006 an estimated 125 incinerators will be closed because of their inability to meet new and stricter air pollution standards, (4) more than 280 new incinerator projects have been blocked, delayed, or canceled in the United States since 1985, (5) in 1999, the Philippines became the first country to ban all waste incineration, followed by Costa Rica, and (6) a growing number of hospitals are destroying infectious material by using steam heat and pressure in autoclaves (which are cheaper to run than incinerators) and other nonincinerator methods for treating medical wastes.

Is Land Disposal of Solid Waste the Answer?
About 54% by weight of the MSW in the United States is buried in sanitary landfills (compared to 90% in the United Kingdom, 80% in Canada, 15% in Japan, and12% in Switzerland). In a sanitary landfill, solid wastes are (1) spread out in thin layers, (2) compacted, and (3) covered daily with a fresh layer of clay or plastic foam.

Figure 13-7 Schematic of a waste-ta-energy incineratarwith pollution controls that burns mixed solid waste and recovers some of the energy to produce steam used for heating or producing electricity. (Adapted from EPA, Let's Reduce and Recycle)

Figure 13-8 Advantages and disadvantages of incinerating solid and hazardous waste.

Modern state-of-the-art landfills on geologically suitable sites are lined with clay and plastic before being filled with garbage (Figure 13-9). The bottom is covered with a second impermeable liner, usually made of several layers of clay, thick plastic, and sand. This liner collects leachate (rainwater contaminated as it percolates through the solid waste) and is intended to prevent its leakage into groundwater. Collected leachate is (1) pumped from the bottom of the landfill, (2) stored in tanks, and (3) sent to a regular sewage treatment plant or an on-site treatment plant. When full, the landfill is covered with clay, sand, gravel, and topsoil to prevent water from seeping in. Several wells are drilled around the landfill to monitor any leakage of leachate into nearby groundwater. Figure 13-10 (p. 316) lists the advantages and disadvantages of using sanitary landfills for disposal of solid wastes. There is no shortage of landfill space in most of the United States.

According to G. Fred Lee (an experienced landfill consultant) and Ann Christy (a researcher at Ohio State

Figure 13-9 State-of-the-art sanitary landfills are designed to eliminate or minimize environmental problems that plague older landfills. Even such state-of-the-art landfills are expected to leak eventually, passing both the effects of contamination and cleanup costs on to future generations.

Figure 13-10 Advantages and disadvantages of using sanitary landfills to dispose of solid waste.

University), the best solution to the leachate problem is to (1) apply clean water to landfills continuously and (2) collect and treat the resulting leachate in carefully designed and monitored facilities. They contend that after 10-20 years of such washing, little potential for groundwater pollution should remain. This wetting would also (1) hasten the breakdown of many wastes to 5-10 years instead of 100 years or longer, (2) provide more room for more trash in the same landfill, and (3) allow old landfills to be dug out and used again.

Is Land Disposal of Hazardous Waste the Answer?
Hazardous waste in the United States is disposed of on land in (1) deep underground wells, (2) surface impoundments such as ponds, pits, or lagoons, (3) state-of-the-art landfills, and (4) aboveground storage facilities.

In deep-well disposal, liquid hazardous wastes (such as cleaning solutions, metals, cyanides, and corrosive solutions) are pumped under pressure through a pipe into dry, porous geologic formations or zones of rock far beneath aquifers tapped for drinking and irrigation water (Figure 12-22, p. 291). In theory, these liquids soak into the porous rock material and are isolated from overlying groundwater by essentially impermeable layers of rock. .

Figure 13-11 lists the advantages and disadvantages of deep-well disposal of liquid hazardous wastes.

Figure 13-11 Advantages and disadvantages of injecting liquid hazardous wastes into deep underground wells.

Figure 13-12 Advantages and disadvantages of storing liquid hazardous wastes in surface impoundments.

Many scientists believe current regulations for deepwell disposal are inadequate and should be improved.

Surface impoundments are excavated depressions such as ponds, pits, or lagoons into which liquid hazardous wastes are drained and stored (Figure 12-22, p. 291). As water evaporates, the waste settles and becomes more concentrated. Figure 13-12 lists the advantages and disadvantages of this method. EPA studies found that 70% of these storage basins in the United States have no liners, and as many as 90% may threaten groundwater. According to the EPA, all liners are likely to leak eventually and can contaminate groundwater.

Figure 13-13 Secure hazardous waste landfill.

designed and monitored secure hazardous waste landfills (Figure 13-13). Sweden goes further and buries its concentrated hazardous wastes in underground vaults made of reinforced concrete. By contrast, in the United Kingdom, most hazardous wastes are mixed with household garbage and stored in hundreds of conventionallandfills throughout the country.

Hazardous wastes also can be stored in carefully designed aboveground buildings (Figure 13-14). These two-story buildings (1) are built of reinforced concrete

Figure 13-14 Aboveground hazardous waste storage facilities can help keep wastes from contaminating groundwater. So far, there has been little use and evaluation of this method. Some scientists and engineers believe with careful design this would be a safer way to deal with hazardous wastes than incinerators, deep wells, surface impoundments, and secure landfills. to prevent damage by storms and hurricanes and to help contain any leakage and (2) use fans and filters to create a negative air pressure to prevent the release of toxic gases.

The first floor contains no wastes but has inspection walkways so people can easily check for leaks from the upper story. Any leakage is collected, treated, solidified, and returned to the storage building.

Each year there are more than 500,000 shipments of hazardous wastes (mostly to landfills and incinerators in trucks or by train) in the United States. On average, trucks and trains carrying hazardous materials are involved in about 13,000 accidents per year in the United States. In a typical year, these accidents (1) kill about 100 people, (2) cause more than 10,000 injuries, and (3) necessitate evacuation of more than 500,000 people. Most communities do not have the equipment and trained personnel to deal with hazardous waste spills.

Is Exporting Hazardous Waste the Answer?
Some hazardous waste producers in the United States and several other industrialized countries have been getting rid of some of these wastes by legally (or illegally) shipping them to other countries, especially developing countries.

Waste disposal firms can charge high prices for picking up hazardous wastes. If they can then dispose of them (legally or illegally) at low costs, they pocket huge profits.

According to a 2001 study by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, more than 450,000 metric tons (500,000 tons) of banned or expired pesticides are seriously threatening the health of millions of people and the environment in nearly all developing countries.

In 1989, countries met and drew up the Basel Convention on Hazardous Waste. It requires exporters to get approval from the recipient nation before a shipment of hazardous wastes can be sent. In 1995, the Basel Convention was strengthened to ban all hazardous waste exports from developed countries to developing countries. The United States is the only industrialized country that has not signed the Basel Convention.

If enforced, this ban on hazardous waste exports will help. However, it would not end illegal trade in these wastes because the potential profits are much too great. To most environmental scientists, the only solution to the hazardous waste problem is to produce as little as possible in the first place (Figure 13-3).

13-7 CASE STUDIES: LEAD AND DIOXINS

How Can We Reduce Exposure to Lead?
Lead is a potent neurotoxin that can harm the nervous system, especially in young children. Each year, 12,000-16,000 American children under age 9 are treated for acute lead poisoning, and about 200 die. About 30% of the survivors suffer from palsy, partial paralysis, blindness, and mental retardation.

Lead can also cause damage at levels far below those that cause acute lead poisoning, especially in children and unborn fetuses. Research indicates that children under age 6 and unborn fetuses with fairly low blood levels of lead are especially vulnerable to (1) nervous system impairment, (2) a lowered IQ (by 4-7 points), (3) a shortened attention span, (4) hyperactivity, (5) hearing damage, and (6) various behavior disorders.

It is good news that between 1976 and 1999 the percentage of U.S. children ages 1-5 with lead levels above the current blood level standard dropped from 85% to 4%, preventing at least 9 million childhood lead poisonings. The primary reason is that government regulations banned (1) leaded gasoline in 1976 (with a gradual phaseout by 1986) and (2) lead-based paints in 1970 (but illegal use continued until about 1978).

The bad news is that even with the encouraging drop in average blood levels of lead, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that at least 800,000 U.S. children still have unsafe levels of lead from exposure to a number of sources such as incineration of solid and hazardous waste, street and floor dust, and paint in older houses.

Moreover, a 1993 study by the National Academy of Sciences and numerous other studies indicate there is no safe level of lead in children's blood. This means several million children in the United States (and an estimated 100-200 million children throughout the world) may be suffering from reduced mental capacity and other harmful effects of lead poisoning.

Health scientists have proposed a number of ways to help protect children from lead poisoning:

. Testing all children for blood levels of lead by age 1.

. Banning incineration of solid and hazardous waste or greatly increasing current pollution control standards for old and new incinerators.

. Phasing out leaded gasoline worldwide over the next decade.

. Testing older housing and buildings for leaded paints and lead dust and removing this hazard. According to government estimates, 83% of U.S. homes (and 86% of public housing units) built between 1950 and 1978 contain lead-based paint.

. Banning all lead solder in (1) plumbing pipes and fixtures and (2) food cans.

. Removing lead from piping and other parts of municipal drinking water systems within 10 years.

. Banning incinerators or landfill disposal of TV sets and computer monitors. Each picture tube in a TV set or computer monitor contains 1.8-3.2 kilograms (4-7 pounds) of lead which can enter the air during incineration and leach from landfills into soil and groundwater.

. Washing fresh fruits and vegetables and hands thoroughly to remove particles of lead dust.

. Testing ceramicware used to serve food for lead glazing.

. Banning imports of lead-laden polyvinyl chloride (PVC) miniblinds and candles with lead cores.

Taking most of these actions will cost an estimated $50 billion in the United States. However, health officials say the alternative is to keep poisoning and mentally handicapping millions of children.

Although the threat from lead has been reduced in the United States, this is not the case in many developing countries. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that (1) 130-200 million around the world are at risk from lead, and (2) 15-18 million children in developing countries suffer from lead poisoning (mostly from use of effects from leaded gasoline).

How Dangerous Are Dioxins?
Dioxins are a family of more than 75 different chlorinated hydrocarbon compounds formed (along with toxic furans) as unwanted by-products in high-temperature chemical reactions involving chlorine and hydrocarbons. Exposing chlorine-containing compounds to high temperatures creates conditions that can produce dioxins and related compounds called furans.

Worldwide, incineration of municipal and medical wastes accounts for about 70% of dioxin and furan releases to the atmosphere. Other sources include (1) residential wood-burning fireplaces, (2) coal-fired power plants, (3) metal smelting and refining facilities, (4) wood pulp and paper mills, and (5) sludge from municipal wastewater treatment plants.

About 30 dioxin compounds are considered to have significant toxicity. One dioxin compound, TCDD, isthemosttoxic (Table 10-1, p. 221) and the most widely studied. Dioxins such as TCDD are persistent chemicals that linger in the environment for decades, especially in soil and human fat tissue. Concern about the harmful health effects of exposure to low levels of dioxins on humans and wildlife is growing.

A 2001 draft report of a comprehensive, EPAsponsored, 6-year, $4 million review by more than 100 scientists around the world concluded that

. TCDD should be classified as a definite human carcinogen, and other dioxin compounds should be classified as likely human carcinogens, especially for people who eat large amounts of fatty meats and dairy products.

. The most powerful effect of exposure to low levels of dioxin by the general public is disruption of the reproductive, endocrine, and immune systems (Connections, p. 224) and their harmful effects on developing fetuses.

. Very small levels of dioxin released into the environment can cause serious damage to certain wildlife species.

Industries producing dioxins say the dangers of long-term exposure to low levels of dioxins are overestimated. They cite a 2000 study by Kyle Steenland, a researcher with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, who found no significant risk of cancer for the general public exposed to low levels of toxic dioxins.

Some environmental scientists argue (1) it will take decades to resolve these issues and (2) meanwhile we should adopt stricter regulations to reduce dioxin emissions as a precautionary strategy. According to these scientists, the best way to sharply reduce emissions of dioxins in the United States (and elsewhere) would be to (1) eliminate the chlorinated hydrocarbon compounds that produce dioxins from hazardous wastes burned in incinerators, iron ore sintering plants, and cement kilns and (2) use nonchlorine methods to bleach paper (as is done in several European countries).

13-8 HAZARDOUS WASTE REGULATION IN THE UNITED STATES

What Is the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act?
In 1976, the U.S. Congress passed the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA, pronounced "RICK-ra") and amended it in 1984. This law requires (1) the EPA to identify hazardous wastes and set standards for their management by states, (2) firms that store, treat, or dispose of more than 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of hazardous wastes per month to have a permit stating how such wastes are to be managed, and (3) permit holders to use a cradle-to-grave system to keep track of waste transferred from point of origin to approved off-site disposal facilities.

What Is the Superfund Act?
In 1980, the U.S. Congress passed the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, commonly known as the Superfund program. Through taxes on chemical raw materials, this law (plus later amendments) has provided a trust fund for (1) identifying abandoned hazardous waste dump sites (Spotlight, p. 320) and underground tanks leaking toxic chemicals, (2) protecting and if necessary cleaning up groundwater near such sites, (3) cleaning up the sites, and (4) when they can be found, requiring the responsible parties to pay for the cleanup.

To keep taxpayers from footing most of the bill, cleanups are based on the polluter-pays principle. The EPA is charged with (1) finding the parties responsible for each site, (2) ordering them to pay for the entire cleanup, and (3) suing them if they do not. When the EPA can find no responsible party, it draws money out of the Superfund for cleanup.

Since 1981, about 1,900 sites have been placed on a National Priority List for cleanup because they pose a real or potential threat to nearby populations. Emergency cleanup has been carried out at almost all sites, and wastes on more than half the sites have been contained and stabilized to prevent leakage. Between 1981 and 2000, 750 sites were cleaned up and removed from the list at a cost of more than $300 billion. The almost 1,500 remaining sites are in various stages of cleanup, with no cleanup planned for 56% of the sites. The former U.S. Office of Technology Assessment and the Waste Management Research Institute estimate the Superfund list could eventually include at least 10,000 priority sites, with cleanup costs of up to $1 trillion, not counting legal fees. Other studies project 2,000 sites with estimated cleanup costs of $200-300 billion over the next 30 years.

These estimated costs are only for cleanup to prevent future damage and do not include the health and ecological costs associated with such wastes. Some environmentalists and economists cite this as compelling evidence that preventing pollution costs much less than cleaning it up.

Since the Superfund program began, polluters and their insurance companies have been working hard to do away with the polluter-pays principle at the heart of the program and make it mostly a public-pays approach.

However, the EPA points out that the strict polluter-pays principle in the Superfund Act has been effective in making illegal dump sites virtually relics of the past-an important form of pollution prevention for the future. It has also forced waste producers who are fearful of future liability claims to reduce their production of such waste and to recycle or reuse much more of what they generate.

What Are Brownfields?
Brownfields are industrial and commercial sites that have been abandoned and Honeybees are being used to detect the presence of toxic and radioactive chemicals in concentrations as low as several parts per trillion. On their forays from a hive, bees pick up water, nectar, pollen, suspended particulate matter, volatile organic compounds, and radioactive material found in the air near the sites they visit.

The bees then bring these materials back to the hive. There they fan the air vigorously with their wings to regulate the hive's temperature. This action releases and circulates pollutants they picked up into the air inside the hive.

Scientists have put portable hives, each containing 7,000-15,000 bees, near known or suspected hazardous waste sites. A small copper tube attached to the side of each hive pumps air out. Portable equipment is used to analyze the air for toxic and radioactive materials.

To find out where the bees have gone to forage for food, a botanist uses a microscope to examine pollen grains to determine what kinds of plants they come from. These data can be correlated with the plants found in an area up to 1.6 kilometers (1 mile) from each hive. This allows scientists to develop maps of toxicity

in most cases contaminated. Examples include factories, junkyards, older landfills, and gas stations. Some 450,000-600,000 brownfield sites exist in the United States, many of them in economically distressed inner cities.

Many of these sites could be cleaned up and reborn as parks, nature reserves, athletic fields, and neighborhoods. But first old oil and grease, industrial solvents, toxic metals, and other contaminants must be removed from their soil and groundwater.

Su h efforts have been hampered by concerns of urban planners, developers, and lenders about legal liability and lawsuits from real or perceived past contamination .of such sites. However, Congress and almost half of the states have passed laws limiting the financial liability for lenders and developers of brownfield sites.

As a result, by 2002, more than 40,000 former brownfield sites had been redeveloped as part of urban revitalization and many other projects are underway. Here are two examples of brown field projects:

. In Dallas, Texas, a brownfield site consisting of a 100-year-old city dump, abandoned grain silos, an aging coal-burning power plant, and a railroad maintenance building has been cleaned up and converted to a $420 million downtown site for a sports and entertainment arena and a complex of apartments, offices and stores.

. Developers in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, plan to rehabilitate an 18-kilometer- (ll-mile-) long abandoned industrial park along the Delaware River, just north of downtown. levels and hot spots on large tracts of land.

This approach is much cheaper than setting up a number of air pollution monitors around mines, hazardous waste dumps, and other sources of toxic and radioactive pollutants. These biological indicator species have helped locate and track toxic pollutants and radioactive material at more than 30 sites across the United States.

Critical Thinking
Because honeybees can pick up toxic pollutants anywhere they go, should honey from all beehives be tested for such pollutants before it is placed on the market? Explain.

13-9 SOLUTIONS: ACHIEVING A LOWWASTE SOCIETY

What Is the Role of Grassroots Action?
BottomUp Change In the United States, local citizens have worked together to prevent hundreds of incinerators, landfills, or treatment plants for hazardous and radioactive wastes from being built in or near their communities. Opposition has grown as numerous studies have shown that such facilities have traditionally been located in communities populated mostly by African Americans, Asian Americans, Latinos, and poor whites. This practice has been cited as an example of environmental injustice.

Most members of such groups recognize that health risks from incinerators and landfills, when averaged over the entire country, are quite low. However, they also know the risks for the people near these facilities are much higher. These people, not the rest of the population, are the ones whose health, lives, and property values are being threatened.

Manufacturers and waste industry officials point out that something must be done with the toxic and hazardous wastes produced to provide people with certain goods and services. They contend that if local citizens adopt a "not in my backyard" (NIMBY) approach, the waste still ends up in someone's backyard.

Many citizens do not accept this argument. To them, the best way to deal with most toxic or hazardous wastes is to produce much less of them, as suggested by the National Academy of Sciences (Figure 13-3). For such materials, their goal is "not in anyone's backyard" (NIABY) or "not on planet Earth" (NOPE) by emphasizing pollution prevention and use of the precautionary principle.

What Can Be Done at the International Level?
The POPs Treaty Between 1989 and 1994, an international treaty to limit transfer of hazardous waste from one country to another was developed (p. 318). In 2000, delegates from 122 countries completed a global treaty to control 12 persistent organic pollutants (POPs), which will go into effect when ratified by 50 countries.

These widely used toxic chemicals are insoluble in water and soluble in fatty tissues. This allows them to be concentrated in the fatty tissues of humans and other organisms feeding at high trophic levels in food webs to levels hundreds of thousand times higher than in the general environment (Figure 8-11, p. 176). These persistent pollutants can also be transported long distances by wind and water.

The list of 12 chemicals, called the dirty dozen, includes DDT and 8 other chlorine-containing persistent pesticides, PCBs, dioxins, and furans. The goals of the treaty are to (1) ban or phase out use of these chemicals and (2) detoxify or isolate stockpiles of such chemicals in warehouses and dumps. About 25 countries will still be allowed to use DDT to combat malaria until safer alternatives are available. Developed nations are supposed to give developing nations about $150 million per year to help them switch to safer alternatives for the 12 POPs.

How Can We Make the Transition to a LowWaste Society?
According to physicist Albert Einstein, "A clever person solves a problem, a wise person avoids it." To prevent pollution and reduce waste, many environmental scientists urge us to understand and live by four key principles: (1) everything is connected, (2) there is no "away" for the wastes we produce, (3) dilution is not always the solution to pollution, and (4) the best and cheapest way to deal with waste and pollution is to produce less of them and then reuse and recycle most of the materials we use (Figures 13-3 and 13-4).

Visible signs of (1) cleaner production (p. 306), (2) increased resource productivity (Solutions, p. 306), and (3) service flow businesses (p. 307) are emerging. Ecoindustrial parks (Figure 13-4) are being built and planned.

Such revolutions start off slowly but can accelerate rapidly as their economic, ecological, and health advantages become more apparent to investors, business leaders, elected officials, and citizens. See the website material for this chapter for some ac.tions you can take to reduce your production of solid waste and hazardous waste.

The key to addressing the challenge oftoxics use and wastes rests on a fairly straightforward principle: harness the innovation and technical ingenuity that has characterized the chemicals industry from its beginning and channel these qualities in a new direction that seeks to detoxify our economy. ANNE PLAIT MCGINN

1. Define the boldfaced terms in this chapter.

2. Distinguish between solid waste and municipal solid waste. What are the major sources of solid waste in the United States?
What happens to municipal solid waste in the United States? Give five examples of solid waste thrown away in the United States.

3. What is hazardous waste? Hazardous waste laws regulate what percentage of the overall hazardous waste produced in the United States?

4. Distinguish between the high-waste and low-waste approaches to solid and hazardous waste management. According to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, what should be the five goals of solid and hazardous waste management in order of their importance?
According to scientists, what percentage of solid and hazardous waste produced could be eliminated through a combination of waste reduction, reuse, and recycling (including composting)?

5. List seven ways to reduce waste and pollution. What is resource productivity? List five ways in which resource productivity has been improved. By how much do some experts think we can improve resource productivity? List five economic advantages of greatly increasing resource productivity.

6. What is cleaner production? Describe the resource exchange system used in Denmark and the pollution prevention program implemented by the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing (3M) company in the United States. List five economic benefits of cleaner production.

7. What is a service flow economy? What are four economic advantages of such an economy for businesses and consumers?
List four examples of how a service economy is being implemented. Describe how Ray Anderson (p. 308) is developing a carpet tile service flow economy business.

8. What is reuse, and what are three advantages of using this approach for waste reduction?
List five examples of reuse.

9. Distinguish between primary (closed-loop) and secondary (downcycling) recycling. What is compost, and how is it used as a way to deal with solid waste?
About what percentage of the municipal solid waste produced in the United States is recycled and composted, and what percentage do experts believe could be recycled and composted?

10. Distinguish between the centralized recycling of mixed solid waste and consumer separation of solid waste, and list the pros and cons of each approach to recycling.

11. Summarize the recycling of (a) wastepaper, and (b) plastics. List nine benefits from recycling paper. Distinguish between preconsumer and postconsumer paper waste. List three reasons why so few plastics are recycled.

12. List the advantages and disadvantages of recycling. What four factors hinder recycling and reuse?
List nine ways to encourage more recycling and reuse.

13. Describe Denmark's hazardous waste detoxification program. What are bioremediation and phytoremediation?

14. Describe the major components of a mass burn incinerator and a sanitary landfill. List the advantages and disadvantages of dealing with solid and hazardous waste by (a) burning it in incinerators and (b) burying it in sanitary landfills.

15. List the advantages and disadvantages of storing hazardous wastes in (a) deep underground wells, (b) surface impoundments, (c) secure landfills, and (d) aboveground buildings. Describe what is being done at the international level about the exporting of hazardous wastes from one country to another.

16. Describe the hazards of lead exposure, and list ten ways to reduce such exposure.

17. What are dioxins? How are they produced, what harm can they cause, and how can we reduce exposure to these hazardous chemicals?

18. How is the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act used to deal with the problem of hazardous wastes in the United States?

19. What is the Superfund Act, and what are its strengths and weaknesses? Describe how honeybees can be used to detect toxic pollutants.

20. What are brown fields, and what has been done to help redevelop such sites in the United States? Give an example of a reclaimed brownfield site.

21. Describe international efforts to control use of 12 persistent organic pollutants (POPs).

22. List four principles that can be used as guidelines for making the transition to a low-waste society.

1. For 1 week, keep a list of the solid waste you throw away. What percentage of this waste consists of materials that could be recycled, reused, or burned for energy? What percentage of the items could you have done without in the first place? Tally and compare the results for your entire class.

2. Explain why you support or oppose requiring that (a) all beverage containers be reusable, (b) all households and businesses put recyclable materials into separate containers for curbside pickup, (c) garbage-collecting systems implement the pay-as-you-throw approach, and (d) consumers pay for plastic or paper bags at grocery and other stores to encourage the use of reusable shopping bags.

3. What short- and long-term disadvantages (if any) might an ecoindustrial revolution based on cleaner production (p. 306) bring?
Do you believe it will be possible to phase in such a revolution in the country where you live over the next two to three decades?
Explain. What are the three most important strategies for doing this?

4. Explain why some businesses participating in an exchange and chemical-cycling network (Figure 13-4, p. 307) might produce large amounts of waste for use as resources elsewhere rather than redesigning their manufacturing processes to reduce waste production.

5. What short- and long-term disadvantages (if any) might there be in shifting to a service flow economy (p. 307)?
Do you believe it will be possible to phase in such a shift in the country where you live over the next two to three decades?
Explain. What are the three most important strategies for doing this?

6. Would you oppose having a hazardous waste landfill, waste treatment plant, deep-injection well, or incinerator in your community?
Explain. If you oppose these disposal facilities, how do you believe the hazardous waste generated in your community and your state should be managed?

7. Give your reasons for agreeing or disagreeing with each of the following proposals for dealing with hazardous waste:

a. Reducing the production of hazardous waste and encouraging recycling and reuse of hazardous materials by charging producers a tax or fee for each unit of waste generated

b. Banning all land disposal and incineration of hazardous waste to encourage recycling, reuse, and treatment and to protect air, water, and soil from contamination

c. Providing low-interest loans, tax breaks, and other financial incentives to encourage industries producing hazardous waste to reduce, recycle, reuse, treat, and destroy such waste

d. Banning the shipment of hazardous waste from one country to another

8. Congratulations! You are in charge of bringing about a cleaner production, resource productivity, and service flow economic revolution throughout the world over the next 20 years. List the three most important components of your strategy.

Try to find the following articles:

1. Isaacs, L. 2001. Rounding up household hazardous waste: Local governments have developed several ways to keep household chemicals and poisonous materials from harming the environment. American City and County 116: 24. Keyword: "phytoremediation." Dealing with hazardous wastes generated in the home is becoming more of a problem than ever. This article looks at some of the ways that household hazardous waste is being managed by a variety of municipaliti s.

2. Evans, L. D. 2002. The dirt on phytoremediation. Journal of Soil and Water Conservation 57: 13. Keyword: "household hazardous wastes." Using plants to clean up certain hazardous wastes has been done for some time, but studies show that plants can contribute even more to the cleanup effort than previously realized.

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