Injected hazards

The sources, amounts, and composition of existing deep-well-injected hazardous wastes... 

Source U.S. EPA, Assessing the Geochemical Fate of Deep-Well-Injected Hazardous Waste A Reference Guide, EPA/625/ 6-89/025a, U.S. EPA, Cincinnati, OH, June 1990. 

The sources, amounts, and composition of injected hazardous wastes are a matter of record, because the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA)5,14 requires hazardous waste to be manifested (i.e., a record noting the generator of the waste, its composition or characteristics, and its volume must follow the waste load from its source to its ultimate disposal site). The sources and amounts of injected hazardous waste can be determined, therefore, based on these records. Table 20.2 shows the estimated volume of deep-well-injected wastes by industrial category.3 More than 11 billion gallons of hazardous waste were injected in 1983. Organic chemicals (51%) and petroleum-refining and petrochemical products (25%) accounted for three-quarters of the volume of injected wastes that... 

This section examines the major processes that affect the fate of deep-well-injected hazardous wastes. The focus is on processes that (1) are known to occur in the deep-well environment or (2) have not been directly observed but are theoretically possible. 

The actual movement of a specific deep-well-injected hazardous substance depends on the types of processes that act on the waste and on the ways in which different processes interact. Figure 20.3 shows the expected change in concentration over time of a deep-well-injected organic compound in an observation well at an unspecified distance from the original point of injection. 

This section discusses how held studies can be used in geochemical fate assessment and includes six cases of deep-well-injection facilities, documenting the geochemistry of the injected hazardous and other industrial wastes. Each case study is organized in the same format, with section headings as follows ... 

Boulding, J.R., 1990, Assessing the geochemical fate of deep-well-injected hazardous waste. US Environmental Protection Agency Report EPA/625/6-89/025a. 

In the United States, injection wells are classified into three categories Class 1 wells are used to inject hazardous wastes Class 2 wells are used to inject fiuids brought to the surface in connection with the production of oil and gas or for disposal of salt water and Class 3 covers solution mining wells [58]. Class 1 wells are heavily regulated by the USEPA and state agencies because of the potential for groundwater contamination. 

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