Page 181 - Solid Waste Analysis and Minimization a Systems Approach

STEP 7: DETERMINE, EVALUATE, AND SELECT WASTE MINIMIZATION ALTERNATIVES 159

■ Impact on the program goal
■ Technical feasibility
■ Operational feasibility
■ Economic feasibility
■ Sustainability
■ Organizational culture feasibility

The key outcome of this phase is to fully document, analyze, and arrive at a final
acceptance decision for each alternative. To accomplish this, process flowcharts are ana-
lyzed, the annualized amount of waste generated is determined, a complete feasibility
analysis is conducted (including technical, operational, and organizational), a cost justi-
fication study is completed, feedback is collected and analyzed, and finally a decision is
made regarding each alternative. This section provides a complete discussions and doc-
umentation of each alternative that will be used in the implementation phase if the alter-
native is accepted. During this process the team must keep a clear understanding of the
overriding goals of the waste minimization project. For example, the relative importance
of reducing costs versus minimizing environmental impact. Some alternatives may
require extensive analysis, including gathering additional data from vendors or analyz-
ing market trends for recyclable material commodity markets. The first consideration
when evaluating alternatives is its impact on the goals of the project established in the
first phase of the project. These goals can range from solid waste generation to the cost-
benefits associated with waste minimization. When considering alternatives, the hierar-
chy of solid waste management should be kept in mind (discussed in Chap. 1). Efforts
should first be made to reduce waste generation, next to reuse waste materials, then recy-
cle waste material (in and out of process), and finally dispose the waste in a landfill. The
idea behind the hierarchy is to engineer methods to eliminate the generation of a waste
stream altogether, and hence eliminate the need to manage the solid waste stream via
recycling or landfill disposal. Alternatives should be separated into different categories
to aid with this process. The categories are (based on the hierarchy)

■ Waste prevention alternatives
■ Reuse alternatives
■ Recycling alternatives
■ Composting alternatives

The evaluation process itself consists of seven steps to rate each alternative. The
process is completed sequentially and after each step, the alterative is either accepted
and moved to the next phase or rejected and the analysis is terminated. If the alterna-
tive does not meet thresholds or feasibility tests it is eliminated from further review to
save the team time and resources. The alternative should still be kept on file in the
event technical or organizational changes render the option feasible. The seven steps
of the evaluation process are as follows:

1 Fully describe each alternative in terms of the equipment, raw material, process, or
purchasing additions or modifications