RCRA today

The hazardous waste regulatory program as we know it today began with the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) in 1976. Since its enactment in 1976, the RCRA has been amended several times, to promote safer solid and hazardous waste management programs (Dennison, 1993). The Used Oil Recycling Act of 1980 and the Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendments of 1984 (HSWA) were the major amendments to the original law. 

Another type of an action level is a regulatory definition of hazardous waste that allows identifying hazardous materials and determining the waste disposal alternatives. The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), which is the law for disposal of solid and hazardous wastes, regulates hazardous waste in its Subtitle C. The RCRA, promulgated in 1976 and amended in 1984, today primarily focuses on regulating the operation of hazardous waste sites and on land disposal activities. 

The manufacture of most products from natural gas feed ultimately relies on a series of catalytically enhanced chemical reactions. For example, a typical 1000—metric ton/day ammonia plant has at least eight unit operations that make use of fixed-bed catalysts, with an overall catalyst volume of approxi-mately 310 m. The catalyst operations vary in useful economic life from 2 to over 10 years, depending on service. Historically, all of the catalysts were disposed of in sanitary landfills, since they are basically inert and pose no environmental or health problems. Today, with stricter regulation of the nation s landfills, under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), greater attention is being given to recycling of catalyst for recovery of the main metal components. Today, numerous, cost-effective processes exist to reclaim valuable metal components from spent catalyst. Complete separation of the spent catalyst into its component parts, and subsequent reuse in the industry, leaves no environmental liability. 

The effective disposal of small volumes of aqueous pesticide wastes Is one of the major practical problems facing American agriculture today. Public concern for the state of groundwater purity and the broad regulations embodied In the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) have stimulated renewed and Increased Interest In the use of microorganisms with unique blodegradatlve properties for the safe disposal of agrochemical wastes. 

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