Waste Management Term Paper – This is one of the best term papers on ‘Waste Management’ especially written for school and college students.
Term Paper on Waste Management
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Term Paper Contents:
- Term Paper on the Introduction to Waste Management
- Term Paper on the Life Cycle of Product and GHG
- Term Paper on the Waste Management Techniques
- Term Paper on Liquid Waste Management
Term Paper # 1. Introduction to Waste Management:
Before industrialization, waste generated was minimal and manageable. Human wastes were mostly biodegradable with minimum impact on the environment. With the increase in population and the industrial revolution, human consumption began to get concentrated and waste began multiplying. The growing quantities of industrial wastes have led to high level of pollution of water, soil and air, affecting natural cycles and biomes.
The crippling effects of pollution on important sinks like forest, soil and ocean have reduced their capacities to absorb GHGs. The waste management processes should therefore include the recycling of recovered valuable from waste, processing the waste for reuse and making the waste eco-friendly before dumping.
The waste management thus plays the dual role of decreasing GHG emissions and preserving the capabilities of sinks to absorb GHGs. EPA estimates that simply increasing our national recycling rate from its current level of 30 percent to 35 percent would reduce GHG emissions by another 10 million tons of carbon equivalent (MTCE).
Waste management refers to the process of:
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(i) Collection of waste matter generated mainly by human consumption and activity,
(ii) Transport and shipment of the collected waste matter to a waste treatment facility, and
(iii) Processing/recycling this waste material for further use or disposing it for good. Waste can be in the form of solid, liquid or gas.
Term Paper # 2. Life Cycle of Product and GHG:
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The different stages of a product’s life cycle generate waste till the end when the product itself becomes a waste.
A product’s life cycle can include following stages:
i. Extraction:
The primary activity of extraction of minerals in mining leads to generation of unwanted materials associated with the required minerals as waste.
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ii. Manufacturing:
The manufacturing process is normally accompanied by certain amount of waste along with the end product. The unavoidable processing waste generated can be more than one type. For example, in iron and steel making plant, the list of waste products includes solid (slags), liquid (pickling liquor), and gas (Blast Furnace gas).
However the iron & steel industry has been able to effectively manage to convert some of the waste into resources or make it eco-friendly before disposal. Thus the slags are used for slag cement, the heat energy of BF gas is recovered through recuperators, and the pickling liquor is neutralized before discharge. The avoidable process waste can be minimized by effective control of inputs and the process parameters.
iii. Transportation:
Transportation of intermediate, final products and waste by vehicular transport leads to GHG emissions. The utilisation of waste and waste treatment facilities in side plant can reduce the transportation activities significantly. In steel melting plants using arc furnace or open hearth process, the steel scraps produced inside the plant are recycled for production of fresh materials. Pickling liquor treatment facility inside the plant allows it to discharge locally.
iv. Packaging and Distribution:
The distribution of products need packaging and thus eventually generates packaging waste. According to Waste Resources Action Programmed (WRAP, UK), an estimated 6.8 Mt of household food waste, equivalent to one third of all purchased food, is produced annually in the UK. This represents over 8 billion pounds in retail value and costs families on average 250-400 pound a year.
Assuming 50% of the food could have been eaten, avoidable waste equates to at least 15 Mt. Packaging protects against damage, contamination and spoilage and printing on the pack provides information to customer. Data from US municipal solid waste studies show an inverse linear relationship between waste food and packaging residues.
v. Worn Equipments and Critical Components as Scrap (Waste):
Worn engineering components, like gears, shafts, bearings etc., become scrap or waste at the end of the life cycle or due to premature failure. Some of the critical components failure may make the whole equipment or machinery as scrap or waste.
Increase in life cycle of engineering components forming vital parts of equipments, machineries, cars, jet planes etc., prevents the whole or major critical components of the equipment from getting scraped as waste. The life cycle improvement not only prevents generation of waste but also leads to saving of materials and energy required to make new products as replacement to scrapped ones.
As manufacturer or user of a product, it is useful to analyze the entire product life cycle to determine where organization can make changes, such as preventing waste, recycling, or buying or manufacturing recycled products, in order to reduce the carbon footprint and thus its impact on global warming. For manufacturers, life cycle analysis provides opportunities for producing goods using less material, which means that less energy, is needed for extracting, transporting, processing raw materials and transporting end products.
Manufacturing goods from recycled materials is beneficial because it requires less energy than producing goods from virgin materials. Also refurbishing of worn equipments and critical components save enormous amount of wastage and leads to reduction in carbon footprints of the components and the equipment.
vi. Disposal:
Disposal of untreated waste can generate GHGs or cause pollution leading to destruction of biomes. Disposal of organic materials like food, paper, and yard waste in landfills can lead to methane formation and subsequent emission from the landfills. Untreated waste can cause havoc by destroying the large number of species living within the affected region.
Term Paper # 3. Waste Management Techniques:
The waste management techniques include the followings:
a. Source Reduction and Conservation:
Waste prevention, or “source reduction,” means consuming and throwing away less. The necessary steps to waste prevention should include, purchasing durable, long-lasting good, seeking products and packaging that are as free of toxics as possible and redesigning products to use fewer raw materials in production, have a longer life, or be used again after its original use. Source reduction actually prevents the generation of waste in the first place, so it is the most preferred method of waste management and goes a long way toward protecting the environment.
b. Recovering Resources from Waste:
As the world population increases and waste grows in volume, the world’s scientists and planners have evolved technologies to recover resources from waste, which can be used again. For example, the developed nations have sophisticated facilities that convert the calorific content present in waste into electricity. In developing nations, manual laborers sift through the waste and extract recyclable material from it, thereby reducing the volume of waste that needs to be disposed.
c. Recycling:
Recycling involves processing of used or worn materials into new products to prevent waste of potentially useful materials. Recycling reduces the consumption of fresh raw materials, reduce energy usage, reduce air pollution (from incineration) and water pollution (from land filling). Recycling of scraps in manufacturing reduces the need for “conventional” waste disposal and requires less energy in comparison to that of the virgin production.
Recyclable materials include many kinds of glass, paper, metal, plastic, textile and electronic items. Recycling is a key component of modern waste management and is the third component of the 3-R principle, viz., “Reduce, Reuse & Recycle” in waste hierarchy. In the case of worn machine components, recycling are carried out after repair and reconditioning and the refurbished equipment life span can be more life than original.
Electronic waste is sent to developing nations where recycling plants extract gold and copper from the e-waste. Used automobiles are scrapped and their metallic parts are sold to factories for re-conversion and so on. Stainless steel, made from at least 60% recycled scrap is one of the most recycled materials. Even after lasting for 100 years or more the stainless steel parts can be recycled again to make ‘new- stainless steels.
Collecting and processing secondary materials, manufacturing recycled-content products, and then purchasing recycled products creates a circle or loop that ensures the overall success and value of recycling. If waste cannot be recycled, incineration or sanitary land filling is the next preferred methods of treatment.
d. Landfill:
This is the most traditional way of managing waste, by dumping it in a landfill. There are several types of solid waste landfills, such as, municipal solid waste, construction, demolition and industrial waste. Modern landfills are well-engineered facilities that are located, designed, operated, and monitored to ensure compliance with rules and regulations, formulated by competent authorities. Solid waste landfills must be designed to protect the environment from contaminants which may be present in the solid waste stream.
The landfill sitting plan—which prevents the sitting of landfills in environmentally-sensitive areas—as well as on-site environmental monitoring systems—which monitor for any sign of groundwater contamination and for landfill gas— provide additional safeguards. In addition, many new landfills collect potentially harmful landfill gas emissions and convert the gas into energy.
e. Incineration:
This involves the disposal of waste by burning it. However, incineration is not an effective tool for waste management, excepting for hospital waste. The burning of waste consumes resources and energy, destroys the recyclable material present in the waste and emits many harmful pollutants.
f. Composting:
This is a technique in which organic waste materials (food, plants, paper) are decomposed and then recycled as compost for use in agriculture and landscaping applications. Compost is defined as relatively stable humus material that is produced from a composting process. In the composting process bacteria in soil convert biodegradable waste in the garbage into organic fertilizer.
The natural process of composting is to pile up the waste outdoors for a year or more in order to allow the degradable trash to break down into organic fertilizer. Modern composting is a multi-step, closely monitored process with measured inputs of water, air and carbon- and nitrogen- rich materials.
The decomposition process is aided by shredding the plant matter, adding water and ensuring proper aeration by regularly turning the mixture. Worms and fungi further break up the material. Aerobic bacteria convert the inputs into heat, carbon dioxide and ammonium. The ammonium is further converted by bacteria into plant- nourishing nitrites and nitrates fertilizers through the process of nitrification.
The compost itself is beneficial for the land in many ways, such as, soil conditioner, fertilizer, and natural pesticide for soil. Compost is a biomass and therefore can be used to produce biofuel.
This is one of the most, effective methods of reducing the amount of material in the waste stream. Yard trimmings and food residuals together constitute 24 percent of the U.S. municipal solid waste stream. That’s a lot of waste to send to landfills when it could become useful and environmentally beneficial compost instead.
g. Mechanical Biological Treatment:
In this technique, a variety of waste (plastic, paper, glass, etc.) are fed in bulk into the waste treatment plant. The MBT process extracts the recyclable content in the waste and converts it to calorific fuel. The heat source produced by MBT can be gainfully used by cement/power plants.
h. Pyrolysis and Gasification:
These are thermal techniques, where waste is treated at high temperatures and at a very high pressure. In pyrolysis, the waste material is converted to solid or liquid. The solid material can be further refined into a carbon form while the liquid extract can be used as energy-giving oil. In gasification, the waste material is converted into a synthetic gas, which can be burned to produce more energy.
Term Paper # 4. Liquid Waste Management:
Liquid waste disposal without pretreatment can be a potential danger to GHG sinks, such as, soil, water, and forests.
The important aspects of liquid waste management include the followings:
i. Source Control and Pre-Treatment:
The source control and pretreatment are essential steps to reduce the organic load, toxicity and volume of industrial commercial waste. The quality of discharge to sewers should conform to stipulations made by regulatory agencies in their specifications.
ii. Recycling:
Recycling and utilizing waste materials can have long-term economic and social benefits. For instance, it may be preferable to treat the sewage in satellite plants for reuse as irrigation water on surrounding forests, farm land, or community facilities such as parks, golf courses and boulevards, even though this may incur additional costs. Similar arguments can be made for recycling sewage effluent for its nutrient content, or recycling sludge for its humus and nutrient content.
Waste as Energy Source:
Gasification process is used to convert biomass or organic waste into carbon monoxide and hydrogen by controlled combustion with oxygen, to form fuel called synthetic gas or syngas.
Anaerobic digestion is a process to make biofuel, in which microorganisms break down biodegradable materials in the absence of oxygen. The process is widely used to treat wastewater sludge and organic wastes, such as waste paper, grass clippings, leftover food, sewage and animal waste, except woody waste because of non-degradable lignin.
Anaerobic digestion is a renewable energy process producing methane-rich biogas suitable for energy production. Also, the nutrient-rich solids left after digestion can be used as fertilizer. As part of an integrated waste management system, anaerobic digestion reduces the emission of landfill gas into atmosphere.
However, technical expertise required to maintain anaerobic digester plus high capital cost and lower efficiencies have so far limited this vital waste treatment technology, although recognized by UNDP as one of the most useful decentralized sources of energy supply, as they are less capital intensive than large power plants.
From 1975, China and India have large government-backed schemes for adaptation of small biogas plants for use in the household for cooking and lighting. Presently, projects for anaerobic digestion in the developing world can gain financial support through the United Nations Clean Development Mechanism for reduced carbon emissions.
Biorefinery:
Biorefinery can produce multiple products including petrol and diesel. Most promising is cellulosic ethanol. Cellulosic ethanol can be made from inedible cellulose fibers that form the stems and branches of plants. Crop residues (such as corn stalks, wheat straw and rice straw), wood waste, and municipal solid waste are potential sources of cellulosic biomass.
Waste Water to Grow Seaweed for Biofuel:
In recent years seaweeds have been used to produce ethanol, for use as biofuel. Apart from natural seaweeds aquaculture technique is used to grow seaweeds. However, millions of tonnes of untreated wastewater are dumped daily into seas and seaweed helps clean it up. Therefore growing large seaweed fields for energy by using waste water as nutrients is a sound economical proposition. This idea has been tested successfully using human waste water in experiments at US institutions, including the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Harbour Oceanographic Institution.