Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
Published: 2000-10-21
Total Pages: 336
ISBN-13: 030906371X
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Incineration has been used widely for waste disposal, including household, hazardous, and medical wasteâ€"but there is increasing public concern over the benefits of combusting the waste versus the health risk from pollutants emitted during combustion. Waste Incineration and Public Health informs the emerging debate with the most up-to-date information available on incineration, pollution, and human healthâ€"along with expert conclusions and recommendations for further research and improvement of such areas as risk communication. The committee provides details on: Processes involved in incineration and how contaminants are released. Environmental dynamics of contaminants and routes of human exposure. Tools and approaches for assessing possible human health effects. Scientific concerns pertinent to future regulatory actions. The book also examines some of the social, psychological, and economic factors that affect the communities where incineration takes place and addresses the problem of uncertainty and variation in predicting the health effects of incineration processes.
Author: Betty C. Willis
Publisher:
Published: 2002
Total Pages:
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This document states the views and policies of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) on the use of incinerators and desorbers to destroy hazardous wastes or decontaminate soil or debris from Superfund sites and other contaminated areas. It refers to incinerators and desorbers as thermal treatment devices. In the broad definition of hazardous waste ex situ thermal treatment technologies, others might include boilers, and industrial furnaces such as cement kilns, or light-weight aggregate and lime kilns that burn hazardous waste-derived fuels. Nevertheless, boilers and industrial furnaces are not covered by this document. The limited definition used here addresses only the ex situ technologies generally used for the treatment of hazardous wastes and wastes contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) found at Superfund sites. This document is intended to provide guidance to health assessors and other health professionals who are called upon for advice on the public health implications of a hazardous waste incinerator or desorption facility. Specifically, it is written for health professionals who (1) conduct technical reviews of thermal treatment technologies, (2) have a technical background, and (3) are somewhat familiar with thermal treatment systems. This document should help U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and thermal treatment facility staff to understand the concerns and information needs public health officials will have when they review a site. It is not meant to replace or modify materials used by other government agencies charged with the responsibility of issuing permits to Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) hazardous waste thermal treatment facilities, or charged with determining which technologies to use to manage Superfund wastes. Because health assessors need detailed technical guidance to ensure that agency staff evaluate thermal treatment facilities in a consistent manner, those without a technical background could find this document difficult to understand. For a synopsis of ATSDR's policies regarding the use of thermal treatment devices, see Public Health Overview of Incineration as a Means to Destroy Hazardous Wastes - Guidance to ATSDR Health Assessors.
Author: Curtis C. Travis
Publisher: CRC Press
Published: 1989-03-31
Total Pages: 170
ISBN-13: 9780849367540
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This informative publication provides an introduction to the public health implications of hazardous waste incineration. The complexities involved in defining, measuring, and regulating the nation's hazardous waste are discussed, as well as brief descriptions of the hazardous waste incineration process. Summaries of the data base for the incinerator test burns conducted by or for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are presented, along with a description of the four components of risk analysis, sample calculations of both carcinogenic and noncarcinogenic health risk estimates, and the predictive methodology employed in quantitative risk assessment for hazardous waste incinerators. Also discussed are the risk estimates for exposure to hazardous waste incinerator emissions, inhalation exposure to incinerator stack releases of heavy metals and to polychlorinated biphenyl compounds, and ingestion exposure to incinerated releases through the terrestrial food chain. This book will be of interest to local regulatory officials, incineration facility operators, researchers in the hazardous waste areas, and concerned citizens.
Author: Stephen M. Roberts
Publisher: CRC Press
Published: 1998-11-19
Total Pages: 372
ISBN-13: 9781566702508
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Incineration: no other form of hazardous waste disposal has matched its efficiency at volume reduction, and the permanent destruction of organic wastes. That convenience may come at a price, as questions and concerns continue to surround the potential human health impacts and ecosystem effects allegedly caused by incineration. Hazardous Waste Incineration: Evaluating the Human Health and Environmental Risks addresses those concerns by summarizing recent research. Commissioned in part by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, this volume compiles reports and observations from specialists throughout the United States. Fourteen chapters respond to the key questions posed by the researchers: What is known about existing hazardous waste incinerators, and their impacts on human health? Can the impacts of a proposed facility be evaluated before it is built, and if so, how? What is the regulatory compliance record of existing commercial hazardous waste incinerators? What methods can be used to monitor a facility's impacts after it is built? Their response: the most complete treatment of the subject-a timely and controversial topic.
Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on Government Operations. Human Resources and Intergovernmental Relations Subcommittee
Publisher:
Published: 1995
Total Pages: 438
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Author: Yves Chartier
Publisher: World Health Organization
Published: 2014
Total Pages: 327
ISBN-13: 9241548568
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This is the second edition of the WHO handbook on the safe, sustainable and affordable management of health-care waste--commonly known as "the Blue Book". The original Blue Book was a comprehensive publication used widely in health-care centers and government agencies to assist in the adoption of national guidance. It also provided support to committed medical directors and managers to make improvements and presented practical information on waste-management techniques for medical staff and waste workers. It has been more than ten years since the first edition of the Blue Book. During the intervening period, the requirements on generators of health-care wastes have evolved and new methods have become available. Consequently, WHO recognized that it was an appropriate time to update the original text. The purpose of the second edition is to expand and update the practical information in the original Blue Book. The new Blue Book is designed to continue to be a source of impartial health-care information and guidance on safe waste-management practices. The editors' intention has been to keep the best of the original publication and supplement it with the latest relevant information. The audience for the Blue Book has expanded. Initially, the publication was intended for those directly involved in the creation and handling of health-care wastes: medical staff, health-care facility directors, ancillary health workers, infection-control officers and waste workers. This is no longer the situation. A wider range of people and organizations now have an active interest in the safe management of health-care wastes: regulators, policy-makers, development organizations, voluntary groups, environmental bodies, environmental health practitioners, advisers, researchers and students. They should also find the new Blue Book of benefit to their activities. Chapters 2 and 3 explain the various types of waste produced from health-care facilities, their typical characteristics and the hazards these wastes pose to patients, staff and the general environment. Chapters 4 and 5 introduce the guiding regulatory principles for developing local or national approaches to tackling health-care waste management and transposing these into practical plans for regions and individual health-care facilities. Specific methods and technologies are described for waste minimization, segregation and treatment of health-care wastes in Chapters 6, 7 and 8. These chapters introduce the basic features of each technology and the operational and environmental characteristics required to be achieved, followed by information on the potential advantages and disadvantages of each system. To reflect concerns about the difficulties of handling health-care wastewaters, Chapter 9 is an expanded chapter with new guidance on the various sources of wastewater and wastewater treatment options for places not connected to central sewerage systems. Further chapters address issues on economics (Chapter 10), occupational safety (Chapter 11), hygiene and infection control (Chapter 12), and staff training and public awareness (Chapter 13). A wider range of information has been incorporated into this edition of the Blue Book, with the addition of two new chapters on health-care waste management in emergencies (Chapter 14) and an overview of the emerging issues of pandemics, drug-resistant pathogens, climate change and technology advances in medical techniques that will have to be accommodated by health-care waste systems in the future (Chapter 15).
Author: Ronald E. Hester
Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry
Published: 1994
Total Pages: 174
ISBN-13: 0854042059
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →There is currently great interest and considerable controversy over waste incineration and this book gives a dispassionate view of the scientific and technical issues involved. It provides a broad overview of the role incineration can play in waste management and looks at how environmental impacts may be managed and assessed.