Waste hazard potential

For example, contaminated areas of a hazardous waste site potentially pose some level of health hazards. 

JRB Associates (1980). Methodology for rating the hazard potential of waste disposal sites. JRB Associates, McLean, VA. 

Interim Status Standards for Hazardous Waste TSDF - Potentially Incompatible Waste Yes 40 CFR 265, App V EPA 1980d... 

Management and disposal of the wide variety of hazardous wastes has been aided by the development of waste classification systems. The term waste classification refers to broadly defined waste categories related, for example, to properties of waste materials, potential risks to human health that arise from waste management or disposal, or the source of the waste. Ideally, hazardous wastes in the same class should pose similar risks to human health and, thus, require similar approaches to safe management and disposal. 

WASTOXHAS is the acronym for WASte ecoTOXic Hazard Assessment Scheme. This method was developed to ensure that unacceptable adverse effects would not arise from landfilled or re-used waste disposal. It is dedicated to assess the long-term leaching hazardous impact of any solid waste containing potentially hazardous substances (e.g., bulk, stabilized, solidified, or vitrified wastes as well as contaminated soils or sediments intended for soil disposal). 

Briefly recalled, the WASTOXHAS approach consists in characterizing the ecotoxicological hazard potential of contaminant fluxes from waste leachate obtained under defined conditions with two different dynamic leaching procedures laboratory simulated leaching tests and field leaching tests. The approach developed below considered a specific scenario that simulates a waste deposit receiving rain or run-off water (Perrodin et al., 2002). 

Based on the different results obtained for the algal and Microtox tests (Figures 7 and 8), a waste PEEP index value was calculated for each waste and each L/S ratio assessed. Each waste index value was then plotted as a function of the corresponding L/S ratio (Fig. 9) and a simple non-linear regression fit (Power model, y = axb) was applied to predict the ecotoxicological hazard potential of leachate fluxes between L/S 4 and L/S 30 ratios. 

For the BA waste, even if sensitivity ranking of ecotoxicity tests is similar, the evolution of ecotoxic hazard potential of the leachate fluxes was different between the two approaches. In the field, the ecotoxic hazard potential of leachate fluxes decreased, whereas it increased for the laboratory column study. The column approach tends to overestimate the long-term ecotoxic hazard potential of BA leachate fluxes generated in the field. This overestimation of the long-term ecotoxic hazard potential of leachate fluxes generated in the field may indicate that relevant factors such as 1) residence time of water in the waste, 2) the continuous or discontinuous watering of the waste and/or 3) the physico-chemical characteristics of the water used for obtaining leachates were not considered in the column approach. 

Stabilization is the process used for reduction of hazard potential of the waste by converting the contaminants into their least soluble, least immobile, or least toxic form. Other characteristics of the waste may not change in this treatment. 

The paper considers how the updated metric, named Radiological Hazard Potential (RHP), can be summated for the radioactive waste streams on a particular site and used to help set priorities for future waste management activities. Uncertainties in RHP values may be utilised to prioritise further sampling and radio-analytical measurements. The paper outlines the difficulties in dealing with hazards posed by non-radioactive materials, and some cautionary advice is given on the correct application of the RHP, particularly in avoiding its use as the sole criterion for establishing work priorities. 

To track the reduction in the hazard potential of a waste from one storage condition (e.g. vault or tank) to another such as immobilised in cement in a stainless steel container. 

Calculations were made for the initial and final states of the waste, and also year by year to show the impact of radioactive decay. Modelling of any short-term increases in hazard potential arising from retrieval, immobilisation and store management operations is outside the scope of the RHP, which is intended to be a measure of progress towards passively safe storage rather than a continuous hazard monitor . The RHP is normally calculated either annually or upon work-stream completion. 

Figure 2 Radiological Hazard Potential - Top impacting Waste Streams...

Gasteiger, R., "Development of an Irradiation Technology for the Recycling of Am-2l+l in Nuclear Reactors — A Contribution to the Possibilities for the Reduction of the Hazard Potential of a-Bearing Wastes," (in German), KFK-21+31 Nuclear Research Center, Karlsruhe, Federal Republic of Germany (1977). 

On the other hand, Np and Pu are very radiotoxic elements and the long-term hazard potential (fig. 1) of a final HTGR-waste deposit is especially determined hy 237Np and 238pu (2.) while the other actinides, apart from the non-recovered U, are of minor importance. Hence, alternative solutions for their disposal are now discussed and investigated (j ). 

An attempt to regulate the evaluation of wastes was presented by the Commission for the Evaluation of Substances Hazardous for Water in March 2003 [18]. It suggests a classification in accordance to the relevant H-criteria of the water-hazard classes for waste. The problem with this approach, however, is that the composition of the waste should be known and focus is given to effects relevant for water-hazard potential. Based on the submitted concept and in accordance with the principle of concern of the Water Management Act, wastes can be treated as not firmly defined substances, such as the substances assigned to the WGK 3 (water-hazard class). 

This simple calculation shows that a 1-m layer of the United States contains about as much long-lived radioactivity and actinides as nuclear industry will put beneath several hundred of those layers within the next 30 years. This illustration does not mean that HLW represents no serious and long-lasting hazard potential, but it emphasizes that the amounts of radioactive material dealt with in waste management are not at all alien to nature. 

It has been suggested that the most hazardous actinides be removed from the reprocessing waste and stored separately. The advantage is (i) to eliminate all actinides from the HAW, so that its hazardous potential follows that of Sr, Cs and Tc, by which the main hazard is gone in about 400 years, and completely in about 100 000 y (ii) to reduce the waste actinides to a small volume, 1/100 to 1/1000 of that of the HAW (and, of course, even much less when compared to the volume of the spent fuel elements), which will simplify the storage problem. For example, such actinide waste could be stored uniquely in very deep bore holes in the ground, eventually in the earth s molten interior. A similar procedure seems possible also for the Sr+Cs fraction. 

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