Page 35 - Materials Chemistry, Second Edition

CAT3525_C01.qxd 1/27/2005 10:54 AM Page 6
6 Waste Management Practices: Municipal, Hazardous, and Industrial
1.2 CATEGORIES OF WASTES
American consumers, manufacturers, utilities, and industries generate a wide spectrum of wastes
possessing drastically different chemical and physical properties. In order to implement cost-effec-
tive management strategies that are beneficial to public health and the environment, it is practical
to classify wastes. For example, wastes can be designated by generator type, i.e., the source or
industry that generates the waste stream. Some major classes of waste include:

● Municipal
● Hazardous
● Industrial
● Medical
● Universal
● Construction and demolition
● Radioactive
● Mining
● Agricultural
In the United States, most of the waste groupings listed above are indeed managed separately,
as most are regulated under separate sets of federal and state regulations.

1.2.1 MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE
MSW, also known as domestic waste or sometimes household waste, is generated within a com-
munity from several sources, and not simply by the individual consumer or a household. MSW orig-
inates from residential, commercial, institutional, industrial, and municipal sources. Examples of
the types of MSW generated from each major source are listed in Table 1.1.
Municipal wastes are highly heterogeneous and include durable goods (e.g., appliances), non-
durable goods (newspapers, office paper), packaging and containers, food wastes, yard wastes, and
miscellaneous inorganic wastes (Figure 1.3). For ease of visualization, MSW is often divided into
two categories: garbage and rubbish. Garbage is composed of plant and animal waste generated as
a result of preparing and consuming food. This material is putrescible, meaning that it can decom-
pose quickly enough through microbial reactions to produce bad odors and harmful gases. Rubbish
is the component of MSW excluding food waste, and is nonputrescible. Some, but not all, of rub-
bish is combustible. Table 1.2 lists materials that constitute MSW.

TABLE 1.1
Municipal Solid Waste Generation as a Function of Source

Residential Food scraps, food packaging, cans, bottles, newspapers,
(single- and multi-family homes) clothing, yard waste, old appliances
Commercial Office paper, corrugated boxes, food wastes, disposable
(office buildings, retail companies, restaurants) tableware, paper napkins, yard waste, wood pallets
Institutional Office paper, corrugated boxes, cafeteria waste, restroom
(schools, hospitals, prisons) wastes, classroom wastes, yard waste
Industrial Office paper, corrugated boxes, wood
(packaging and administrative; not process wastes) pallets, cafeteria wastes
Municipal Litter, street sweepings, abandoned automobiles, some
construction and demolition debris
Adapted from Franklin Associates, EPA530-R-98-010, 1999.