Solid Waste Eng

MEE 5901, Advanced Solid Waste Management 1

UNIT I STUDY GUIDE

Integrated Solid Waste

Management

Course Learning Outcomes for Unit I Upon completion of this unit, students should be able to:

1. Identify and discuss recycling obstacles and solutions. 2. Identify the continuous goals of solid waste management reduction. 3. Summarize the options for reducing the generation of waste materials. 4. Assess some of the obstacles identified with recycling. 5. Explain energy conversion in solid waste management.

Unit Lesson From a historical perspective we can see that humans are constantly making decisions on what to use and what to throw away. The production of waste is ultimately a consequence of everyday life. Around 10,000 BC, humans changed their lifestyles to living closer together as opposed to further apart. This led to the beginning of waste, which piled up and became a huge problem. Throughout the years, waste management was uncoordinated and disorganized. There were no state solid waste programs, little federal presence, no solid waste service companies, and salvage and reclamation were limited to industries (Hickman, 2000). The emergence of the industrial age fostered the science of economics and prompted many leading thinkers to attempt to bring rational order to the seemingly chaotic world around them (Worrell & Vesilind, 2012). Throughout the 1700s and into the 1800s, concepts were developed by comparing the growing human population to its economic consequences. Adam Smith (1723-1790) introduced the idea of faith and positivism in that the growing human population could positively change their own behaviors to benefit themselves. Thomas Malthus (1766-1834) reasoned that the growth of the human population would affect food resources which would, in turn, lead to famine among humans. The scarcity of land became noticeable however when, later on, the growth of the human population generated even more waste. People noticed and began to create alternatives to handle the growing waste management problem. Reduction, reuse, recycling, and recovery became the feasible options for lowering waste generation. Legislation formed different laws to address the growing issue of solid waste management. On April 26, 1999, the Landfill Directive was put into effect and made it a law that municipal waste must be treated prior to being landfilled. Goals were established along with the improved use of landfills to include prevention, preparation for recycling, and energy recovery. Since waste reduction is essentially pollution prevention, the idea has caused different cities to form reuse and recycling efforts. Clothing is passed down from person to person, paper and plastic bags are reused, and empty coffee cans are used for storage. Recycling efforts are also set up and coded so that people can drop off their recyclables (plastic, paper, etc.) and the city will separate and haul

Reading Assignment Chapter 1: Integrated Solid Waste Management

Suggested Reading Environmental Protection Agency www.epa.gov

MEE 5901, Advanced Solid Waste Management 2

them away. The disposal of solid waste that isn’t necessarily recyclable goes to landfills. Obstacles that people have come up against though in this method include rodents, odor, pollution, and insects. These are being addressed accordingly through energy combustion, compacting, and improving the design of the landfills. Liners are now used in the development of sanitary landfills to stop the leakage of contaminated ground water into the soil. Through the development of methods to treat solid waste management, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has recognized that all of the methods developed to this point are interchangeable. Recognizing this, the EPA has created the Integrated Solid Waste Management (ISWM) strategy in which they combine strategies listed from the most to the least desirable:

1. reducing the quantity of waste generated, 2. reusing the materials, 3. recycling and recovering materials, 4. combusting energy for recovery, and 5. landfilling.

Overall, communities must consider all of these strategies and integrate the one that works best for them. If one strategy does not work, they must divert to an alternative strategy for safely dealing with solid waste management.

Reference Worrell, W. A. & Vesilind, P. A. (2012). Solid waste engineering

(2nd ed.). Pacific Grove, CA: CL-Engineering.