Land disposal of hazardous waste and their adverse effect on environment
Hazardous waste can be described as the waste exhibiting properties that can potentially harm and human health and environment. The hazardous waste is generated from several sources that ranges from the manufacturing processes, industrial activities, wastes from the batteries and the hazardous can be in different form including sludges, solid gases and liquids. Hazardous wastes are disposed of mainly in the landfills (Higgins, 2017). Thus, it is important to mention that disposal of hazardous wastes requires proper waste management strategies due to the issues related to pollution. Even though the recycling and reusing of the hazardous wastes is not always the best strategy, there is always the needs for the treatment options for the hazardous wastes before they are disposed. The hazardous materials are treated through the physical, biological, thermal, chemical methods. The various type of pollution that can affect from the land disposal of the hazardous waste ranges from the air pollution, water pollution to land pollution (De Feo & De Gisi, 2014). Hazardous wastes cause damage to the environment through several ways as it has both the long term and he short term effects. The short term effects include the water pollution. The hazardous wastes that are poured into the aquifers, lakes, rivers and streams render the agricultural purpose and drinking unsafe. The long term effect of the environment includes the destruction of the natural resources, trash into the green spaces, waterways, disease in the humans, cancer in humans and mutation in animals (Jiao, Qi & Yanmei, 2013). This study is based on the land disposal of the hazardous wastes and the various environmental pollution it causes, the alternative strategies for mitigating the hazardous waste disposal, the policies in relation to the land disposal of the hazardous wastes internationally and in Australia.
Hazardous waste can be defined as the waste that has the ability to affect the quality of environment. Hazardous wastes have been classified under the category of substances that has one or more of the hazardous traits that include, reactivity, toxicity, corrosive nature and ignitability (Blackman, 2016). In accordance to the research studies, it can be stated that the hazardous wastes can be present in the physical, chemical or gaseous form. It should be critically noted that the hazardous waste materials must be discarded with care as it can potentially hamper the quality of the environment if not discarded in an efficient manner. Depending upon the nature of the hazardous waste, the mechanism of treatment and disposal is determined. The hazardous waste substances have been reported to elicit a major impact on the environment based upon the nature of toxicity. It should be critically mentioned here that the hazardous materials can affect the quality of air, water, land and wild life to a significant extent (Guerrero et al., 2013). Every day an excessive amount of hazardous waste is generated from factories that lead to the deterioration in the quality of environment. Despite the stringent quality of hazardous waste disposal it should be significantly noted that there is still a scope of contamination. In accordance to the statistical evidences, it has been stated that hazardous waste accidents primarily led to the loss of $16 million in property, forcing 22,757 individuals to evacuate (Grasso, 2017). The impact of the hazardous waste on the environment can be studied under two sub-headings. The first being the short term effect on the environment and the second being the long-term effect on the environment. The short term effect primarily comprises of the risk due to water pollution. The chemical toxins from the hazardous waste that enters into the water body affects the quality of water thereby altering the quality of water to be used for agricultural purposes. In addition to this, it should also be highlighted that when animals consume the water from these water bodies, the physical health is seriously affected. The long-term effects have been studied as prolong effects that initiate a long-lasting significance. Physical health factors such as mutation have been reported to be one of the significant factors that lead to the impaired health quality of the people (Grasso, 2017). Moreover, it should further be noted that it leads to the disruption of the natural equilibrium and as a result the insects and birds that are essential in order to maintain the ecological balance of the nature are also affected.
In order to effectively evaluate the impact of hazardous waste disposal on the quality of soil, it should be mentioned that the degree of adversity depends upon the time duration to which the soil had been exposed to the hazardous element. Based upon the rate of accumulation in the land, the toxic wastes possess the ability to remain toxic for generations. It has been stated that the surface soil acts like a sponge and comprises of less-dense silica layer. This property makes it the best substrate for the liquid and gaseous ions to traverse in the medium. When the surface layer of the soil gets polluted due to the addition of contaminants, for instance Gasoline, from a leaking underground storage tank, the hazardous chemicals liberated does not remain confined to the area of the point of leakage (Lu et al., 2013). The leaked hazardous chemicals spread underground and percolated inside the soil. It further enters the underground system and affects the quality of the ground water. The toxic material can further be carried from the underground source to other water wells that are used by common people for the purpose of irrigation and agriculture. In addition to this several other disastrous effect of inefficient hazardous waste management include the following:
Soil contamination: Hazardous chemicals possess the potential to harm the quality of the soil structure (Lehman, 2013). Further, it should also be mentioned here that this leads to the creation of a barren land because the vegetation of the area is completely devastated as the plants absorb the contaminants through the roots that hamper the structure of the soil.
Leachate: The hazardous chemicals in contact with ground water forms a toxic chemical mixture known as Leachate that potentially harms the quality of ground water and surface water.
Surface water contamination: The hazardous wastes enter the water bodies and alter the composition as well as the pH level of the water (Achillas et al., 2013). This leads to alteration in the quality of water based on which the entire marine ecosystem comes to a standstill.
Health Issues: On account of heavy disposal of hazardous wastes on the land, the contaminated soil serves as a breeding ground for numerous microbial agents that affect the health and well-being of living beings.
Decline in Soil Organic Matter: According to research studies, it has been stated that the accumulation of hazardous industrial wastes, lead to the decline in the organic matter content of the soil (Manahan, 2017). This consequently affects the rate of fertility and production. Decrease in the fertility of soil has been reported to possess a direct relationship with the loss of biodiversity and degradation of soil level.
Therefore, it can be stated that the dumping of hazardous solid wastes elicits a harmful impact on the environment. The adversities can be fatal and lead to a complete disruption of the ecological equilibrium if steps are not undertaken to combat the seriousness of the issue. In this context, it should be highlighted that developed nations such as United States of America and Germany have an efficient strategy to manage solid hazardous wastes (Titenberg & Lewis, 2016). However, it should be critically noted that developing countries of the world such as African nations have yet to strategically manage and plan to enhance strategies in order to deal with toxic waste management (Lehman, 2013). The seriousness of the problem is rapidly engulfing the world at an alarming rate. Moreover, the population explosion and industrialisation in the urban areas are the prime reasons why the accumulation of wastage is on the rise. Efficient waste disposal strategies can help in safe disposal of the hazardous wastes.
The hazardous wastes that are disposed in land include wide ranging substances, such as solvents and paints, radioactive wastes, ammunition, cadmium, nickel or lithium batteries, appliances containing refrigerant, cleaning agents, propane cylinders and aerosol cylinders, electronics, mercury containing wastes, pesticides, automotive wastes (Greenberg, 2017).
The hazardous wastes are categorized into four major types:
- Toxicity- the toxic wastes are the ones that are considered to fatal or harmful when absorbed or ingested (the hazardous wastes might contain lead and mercury). When the toxic wastes are disposed in land then there is a chance of contaminated liquid leaching from the wastes and polluting the ground water that will in turn pose a hazard for the environment.
- Reactivity- The reactive wastes are considered to be unstable under the conditions which is termed as normal. The reactive nature of the toxic substance leads to the formation of toxic gases, toxic fumes, and explosions. Additionally, if the hazardous wastes by somehow gets heated up, mixed with water and compressed then there is a chance of vapours emanating from the waste. There are examples which include the explosives, lithium sulphur batteries (Van der Sloot & Kosson, 2012).
- Corrosivity- the corrosive wastes are called the bases and the acids (pH greater than or equal to 12.5 and pH less than or equal to 2) are capable of corroding the barrels, drums, storage tanks and the metals containers in which the hazardous wastes are stored. An example for corrosive hazardous waste is the battery acid.
- Ignitibility- the wastes that are ignitable under certain conditions catches fire and are spontaneously combustible. The ignitable wastes that catches fire at certain conditions have a flash point of 60 degrees Celsius. The examples of the ignitable hazardous wastes include the waste oils that are used as the solvents (Van der Sloot & Kosson, 2012).
Usually the hazardous wastes are disposed in the regular landfills which lead to the infiltration of various hazardous materials in the ground and also interact with the hydrological system (Higgins, 2017). However, in the current decades due to increasing societal mandate introduction of effective strategies in order to replace the land disposal of hazardous wastes through various treatments and technologies in an effective manner has been influenced. The idea of implementing alternative strategies has developed from the impact of land disposal on the health of individual and environment as well. Thus, it has become one of the major concern to identify alternative ways for disposal of hazardous wastes in order to reduce the harmful impact on health and environment in an effective manner (Greenberg, 2017). In this regards, multiple technologies ranges from alternative disposal to recycle of the hazardous compound have been introduced in order to avoid the hazardous disposal on landfills. The overall strategies could be classified as onsite containment, onsite destruction, waste to energy through incineration and recycle process (Grasso, 2017).
The onsite containment process refers to the method in which the chemical or biological composition or character of the hazardous waste materials are altered in order to neutralize the waste materials or make it safer to dispose, transport or store without any harmful effect. It is possible to accumulate and treat the hazardous waste materials with effective treatment process such as neutralization or solidification (Higgins, 2017). As mentioned that the process of shipping or disposing the hazardous waste materials on land could lead to various health issue and could affect the environment system, in addition the process is costly as well. In this regards the process of neutralization is effective as it helps to reduce the corrosivity of hazardous compound. The corrosive things may include industrial cleanser, spent catalyst, sludge or by products of different chemical reaction (Grasso, 2017). The neutralization process is a chemical process that helps to adjust the pH of the waste materials between 5.5 to 9.5 and alters the corrosive characteristics and make it safer to dispose and it is cost-effective as well (Higgins, 2017). On the other hand solidification process allow the generators to solidify the waste material and transport it to the specific and secured waste landfills. Cement based solidification has been found to be most applicable process for solidification as it helps to reduce the toxicity and transmission of contaminants. There are five different divisions of the cements that are categorized according to the components and strength of the waste materials. The process of converting the hazardous waste materials into cement include various stages such as use of phosphate and sulfur compounds in order to decrease the curing or settling time of the cement, using pH adjustment reagents, decrease the ability of the contaminants to leach and enhance the compressive strength (Wang, Tsang & Poon, 2015). However, the process of onsite treatment requires the permission of the land disposal policies developed by the state or country as there are various rules regulation regarding this and thermal treatment for neutralization is restricted in many places due to the application of excessive heat (Greenberg, 2017).
The process of online destruction is another possible strategy that could help to reduce the hazardous land disposal. Such way of eliminating the hazardous waste materials sometimes termed as pyrolysis as high temperature is used in the process of destruction. In this process an ultra-high temperature electrical arc is used in the inert condition in order to reduce the risk of combustion to destroy the hazardous waste materials in an effective manner (Chen et al., 2015). However, this technique is limited to some specific hazardous waste materials or industries. For example, the technique of pyrolysis could be utilized in the high temperature scalding under some specific circumstances. The treatment is mainly used in case of organic wastes such as pesticides, polychlorinated biphenyl or PCBs and other organic pollutants as well. Furthermore, various cement kilns are also used for pyrolysis in case of oils or other solvents as hazardous compound (Al-Duri, Alsoqyani & Kings, 2015).
Incineration is another waste treatment technique which is associated with the combustion of organic compounds present in the hazardous waste materials. The process of incineration is also described as the high temperature waste treatment or thermal treatment as well. However, it is different from pyrolysis as it helps to produce energy from the hazardous waste materials, thus considered as waste to energy process (Malindzakova et al., 2015). It was informed by study that heat treatment releases toxic gases from the combustion however, effective technology has been developed that helps to produce energy from the gases produced during thermal treatment. The improved techniques help to control the amount of oxygen during heat treatment and utilize the steam produced in order to drive turbine for the production of electricity (Higgins, 2017). Hence, the thermal treatment could be used to reduce the amount of hazardous waste materials and disposal of such hazardous materials in land, further it could be beneficial as it helps to produce energy.
Recycle is another effective process that could help to reduce the amount of hazardous waste materials and its disposal in land. There are some hazardous waste materials that could be recycled for example, electric circuit boards, lead acid batteries and some other heavy metals. The heavy metals in such kinds of ashes processed in an effective manner through appropriate treatment, they could associate with other pollutants and help to transfer them into materials that are easy to dispose. In addition, they could be used as pavement filling as well. Recycling such products could help to reduce the harmful effect of bottom ash, fly ash or harmful chemical (Hadi et al., 2015).
Therefore, it is demonstrated that there are a numbers of strategies or ways that could be used in order to reduce the amount and harmful effect of hazardous waste materials and such processes are effective enough in order to reduce the disposal of hazardous waste materials in land. Thus, implementing the appropriate process for the specific hazardous waste material is important in order to reduce the risk of harmful effect of hazardous land disposal on health and environment system (Greenberg, 2017).
The amount of hazardous waste generated in Australia is increasing every year and as per the Australian official governmental website, the rate of waste growth in the year 2011 to 213 was more than 9% increase every year (Chandrappa & Das, 2012). These wastes are coming from the activities such as manufacturing, mining, construction organizations and others due to which such growth are observed. Therefore, from the influence of international hazardous waste disposal related policies, the Australian government also focusing on the development of several policies so that the disposal of hazardous materials can be controlled (Zaman, 2012).
The standards related to hazardous waste in Australia are Australian hazardous waste data and reporting standards 2017 and the testing Australian hazardous waste data and reporting standard 2017 (Zaman, 2014). Both these policies and standards are modified after increasing amount of wastes and national reporting regarding the failure of the previous standards in controlling the waste disposal. Further, another important waste disposal and management policy of Australian government is hazardous Waste Act 1989 in which the government properly observes the regulatory aspects such as import and export of predisposal and disposed wastes respectively at the site of waste disposal (Marshall & Farahbakhsh, 2013). This ensures that people as well as animals around that area are safe form the deleterious effects of those hazardous material. Further, it also helps to make the environment clean form such hazardous dust particles both inside and outside Australia as they are protected from the harmful wastes (Guerrero, Maas & Hogland, 2013).
As the hazardous waste disposal is one of crucial factors in maintaining the environment and determining the level of purity of the environment (White, Dranke & Hindle, 2012). There are several countries hazardous waste disposal standards and policies which could be used by other governments so that the management of waste disposal becomes easier. Such as in Canada, it is the government that controls the waste disposal and management (Rochman et al., 2013). Further, besides having details about the hazardous wastes, the government completely tracks the waste product till its disposal so that from export import to recycle of the hazardous waste product. This helps in the identification and observation in the flaws and loopholes in the hazardous waste management and hence, the governments should think about implementing this in their country (Chandrappa & Das, 2012). Further for the management and planning of hazardous waste disposal, the Canadian government has also created the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment (CCME), so that while determining the hazardous waste disposal observations and management, the officials of this officials can determine the faults and loopholes the disposal management system possess that makes the standards related to solid hazardous waste management less effective (Rochman et al., 2013). Therefore, from both of these Australian and internationals specifically Canadian hazardous waste disposal and management policies it could be assessed that the governments are focusing more on the disposal if these wastes to make it out of the reach of humans, but in this course they are infecting the nature, that afterwards effects the civilization itself. Therefore, this aspect should be observed by the policy makers in Australia (Zaman, 2014).
Conclusion
From the above conclusion it can be concluded that the hazardous waste is generated from several sources that ranges from the manufacturing processes, industrial activities, wastes from the batteries and the hazardous can be in different form including sludges, solid gases and liquids. Hazardous waste is disposed of mainly in the landfills. Usually the hazardous wastes are disposed in the regular landfills which lead to the infiltration of various hazardous materials in the ground and also interact with the hydrological system. However, in the current decades due to increasing societal mandate introduction of effective strategies in order to replace the land disposal of hazardous wastes through various treatments and technologies in an effective manner has been influenced. The idea of implementing alternative strategies has developed from the impact of land disposal on the health of individual and environment as well.
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