Transcript Recycling and Materials - Manistique Area Schools

Chapter 12 Notes #3
Section 2 and 3
Producing Less Waste..
• Important to the natural
environment and us
– Costs us less money
– Conserves natural
resources
Producing Less Waste..
• Methods
– Reusable materials
– Less packaging
– Recycling
• Al
• Steel from scrap
– Buy “recycled”
– Composting
• Compost – dark colored crumbly
material made from decomposed
vege and animal materials, rich in
nutrients, that help plants grow
– Source Reduction
Recycling
1. Materials must be collected
and sorted by type
2. Each type goes to a facility
where it can be cleaned
and made ready to be used
again
3. Materials are used to
manufacture new products
4. Finally buyers for these new
products must be found
Degradable Plastics
• Photodegradable
– If left in the sun it eventually
becomes weak and breaks into
pieces
• Biodegradable
– Blend of cornstarch and a special
chemical
– When buried the bacteria in the soil
ear the cornstarch and the plastic
becomes weak and eventually falls
apart
• Problem:
– Plastics is still there, just smaller
• Hazardous Waste
– Toxic, highly corrosive, or
explosive
– Ex. Heavy metals,
pesticides, radioactive
waste, PCB’s, etc.
– Disposed of:
• by “deep-well injection”
• or “surface impoundment”
• Burying drums
• The Love Canal
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Site at Niagara Falls, NY
Chemical Dump site-1942
Filled/closed in 1953
Sold to a school
Houses and school built
Chemicals escaped, appeared in
yards, children were burned, strong
smell
– Dizziness, blurred vision, birth
defects, still births, etc.
– $275 million in clean-up and
relocation costs
• Resource Conservation and
Recovery Act Created in 1976
• Governs the disposal of solid &
hazardous waste
• Must keep records of how
wastes are handled
• Legally responsible for any
problems until the waste has
been placed in a proper
disposal facility
•The Comprehensive
Environmental Response
Compensation and Liability Act
of 1980 became known as the
“Superfund Act”
•Gives the EPA the right to sue
companies that do not properly
document and dispose
hazardous waste
•It also created a fund to pay for
cleaning up abandoned
hazardous waste sites