Most of the waste we create is water based
And since distilling of the water is a expensive
Not really an option
So how are you taking care of your waste
What tricks do you implement to keep it as low as possible ?
My list is large and every sop has a different approach things I take into account first
What’s the expected volume
What’s the expected waste so is it solvent rich
Is it salt rich or both
Why do I need it ?
As an example I reuse my brine water of the first wash for quenching PTSA reactions many times the solubility is high and there is no need to use fresh water every time on the first quench
On phosforic acid reactions the same only this time I try to use a base to quench to make a salt that has valeu to the farmer who s premises I use yes that s right often the reagents we use can easily be made to salts that can have a valeu to someone else
On the technical solutions I have implemented i ll get some pic s made and edit this tread in the near future
The info is burried somewhere in Title 40 CFR section 261.3
Without spending hours myself searching through federal regulations, my guess (please is only a guess!) (this may be done my hazmat themselves or if you were a real pharma company you’d do it this way yourself): The pTSA brine solution would need to be completely neutralized with alkali to enable further safe handling and material compatibilities. The water would then need to be evaporated off and vented to atmosphere to reduce volume, vented steam would require abatement methods for liberated noxious fumes. A solid waste residue would remain with trace water content. The solid waste would then be dissolved in a compatible solvent and injected into a catalytic thermal oxidizer to destroy the material. Injection of anhydrous ammonia would likely be required to abate liberated sulfuric acid residues from the gas stream.
TLDR: evaporate the water and “burn” the residues.
In lieu of evaporating large amounts of water, reverse osmosis may be used to remediate the brine, but there are limits to its efficiency. PPB levels of contaminants will remain and depending on regulations, this could still lose an issue.
Once filtered, the brine solution ideally would be surrendered to hazmat disposal and the used filters would be surrendered for incineration.
All would depend if regulations distinguish between solid and liquid of the specific waste.
I’m fairly certain that you are only allowed to “destroy” your own generated hazardous waste if you are a licensed TSD no? There are only few instances of unregulated hazardous wastes to my understanding that allow you to “destroy them” on-site.
It’s going to depend on the chemical properties of the waste, whether it is a listed waste for any of the acute lists, or categorized under a specific “use category” of hazardous waste. If not then it most likely needs to have some type of physio-chemical property analysis performed to determine if it falls under any of the general hazardous waste categories such as combustable, oxizider, corrosive, etc…
Furthermore, if you are diluting down your waste or “burning off the water” to change your waste composition, I am also fairly certain that is considered treating your own waste. Technically that is not allowed either unless, again, you are a licensed TSD.
If the evaporation of the water is part of the process, that’s different, but if it’s only there to treat the waste, that is a problem.
I would echo @phenethylamine1 comment of reading through your 40 CFR chapters, generally 260 - 280 or so cover various hazardous waste regulations. I’d also suggest getting proper RCRA and DOT hazardous waste training to help asses how to handle your waste properly.
Furthermore, if you are disposing of waste, you need to have your DOT hazardous waste training to technically be able to sign the hazardous waste transfer manifest to the TSD without being federally liable for signing it without training, as you are handing off the waste at that point.
This all makes sense thx for the clarification @phenethylamine1@Zoraku
But this tread would be short if the final verdict is get training and dispose as the law abides
As I said before I run illegal and at the same time I try to do it as responsible as I can
Sure there are more in this field on the forum
And I hope to get some tricks and tips
Of how to keep the waste to a minimum
Wow. That’s not how I’ve handled waste management ever. I don’t worry about evaporating things off - instead I use process tanks, capture everything separately/safely, and then I create a precipitate, then I use microfluid filtration to remove that precipitate from the water creating a cake/sludge. Then that cake sludge goes somewhere else.
I don’t evaporate because evaporating takes a lot of energy and has in my experience created a lot of weird things that can leave.
There are entire companies focused on waste water handling that can sell you these systems, they aren’t that expensive (compared to evaporation costs or shipping your waste somewhere to be handled).
At the end you have water that may or may not be contaminated. Work with your local waste water facility - they will put you in a testing program and tell you how much waste water you can dump into the local waste water handling system (aka the sewer). They will also tell you if you cannot dump the water, etc. and they will have local operators who can take the materials from you.
I often advocate reading the regulations - its worth noting that for many of these chemicals you have to have both a license to process them, use them, and handle their wastes safely. Those licenses are often given out at the federal level…so good luck getting them at all if you are THC touching. -shrug-
Having someone with HAZWOPPER and other hazardous training would be helpful for this. But really - minimize the amount of waste you create…
But yeah - create the solid, filter, consolidate. And then offload the material. There are shell companies that will buy your waste to get it into the legal waste stream. They exist, so ask around locally.
Even if you are producing A LOT of waste - there are companies that will take it by the truckload and do the processing I’m talking about. I don’t know just how illegal you are, but if you have a certificate of occupancy and a business license or EIN you can get clean management to come and handle your waste.
When I say “burn” this is what waste companies actually do if not bury the waste. When you give waste to a company, it doesn’t just magically disappear.
I’m familiar with disposal of pharmaceutical and industrial waste through pyrolysis. Very high temperature incinerators are used to dispose of everything from organic materials all the way to hex chrome and cadmium.
Please don’t burn your waste at your lab, that’s not what I’m saying lol.
Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of insight on what you can do from a black market perspective. A lot of hazardous waste goes to incineration if it can’t be reclaimed, so you can always try to leverage it for burning…but burning to open air can be just as bad so that’s till not even a really good option.
Trying to dispose of hazardous waste without going through the proper channels is not very easy and probably not really that much better for the environment.
Maybe you can create a legal shell company so you can get a “legal way” to have your hazardous waste picked up? In the states you need to get a state or federal facility identification number if you are a hazardous waste generator, as well as register with the DOT that you will have hazardous waste that gets picked up for transport. So even doing that, there’s a lot of hoops to jump through.
I don’t have an easy solution for you unfortunately.
And as for @phenethylamine1 , I take everything pretty literally, so you’ll have to spell it out for me :).
Just make sure when you burn your residual pTSA, do it under a fume hood. Also a little secret I found is that if you take a deep breath of the fumes, only a little bit, and hold for 5 seconds, it actually works as a potent psychedelic by cyclizing the 5HT2A receptor site just like LSD does. You’ll experience a full ego death and everything! Just make sure to vent most of it outside, you only want to take a little bit in, not the whole smoke cloud.
This comes straight from @kingwook. The pTSA turns the 5ht2a receptor from the d9 to the d8 position just like salvia divinorum, the most potent mu opioid agonist on the market. Who knew that lab waste is the safest and most plentiful mind expanding substance in the world. pTSA vapor promotes mindfulness and openness in even the most stressful environments. When meditation and self help doesn’t cut it, you can always vape a little pTSA and you’ll align your chacras and past lives together as one.