Special features of this book include: practical "how to" instructions, state/federal regulations-plus overview, lab waste management, interpretations of regulations, enforcement, generator checklist, and complete coverage. This handbook is an excellent resource for hazardous waste managers, safety managers, lab managers, occupational health/safety workers, hazardous waste brokers, and small business managers. Disposal facilities, trade associations, consultants, administrators, attorneys, unions, and industrial hygienists will find this practical guide useful as well.
Environmental remediation technologies to control or prevent pollution from hazardous waste material is a growing research area in academia and industry, and is a matter of utmost concern to public health, to improve ecology and to facilitate the redevelopment of a contaminated site. Recently, in situ and ex situ remediation technologies have been developed to rectify the contaminated sites, utilizing various tools and devices through physical, chemical, biological, electrical, and thermal processes to restrain, remove, extract, and immobilize mechanisms to minimize the contamination effects. This handbook brings altogether classical and emerging techniques for hazardous wastes, municipal solid wastes and contaminated water sites, combining chemical, biological and engineering control methods to provide a one-stop reference. This handbook presents a comprehensive and thorough description of several remediation techniques for contaminated sites resulting from both natural processes and anthropogenic activities. Providing critical insights into a range of treatments from chemical oxidation, thermal treatment, air sparging, electrokinetic remediation, stabilization/solidification, permeable reactive barriers, thermal desorption and incineration, phytoremediation, biostimulation and bioaugmentation, bioventing and biosparging through ultrasound-assisted remediation methods, electrochemical remediation methods, and nanoremediation, this handbook provides the reader an inclusive and detailed overview and then discusses future research directions. Closing chapters on green sustainable remediation, economics, health and safety issues, and environmental regulations around site remediation will make this a must-have handbook for those working in the field.
This is the second edition of the WHO handbook on the safe, sustainable and affordable management of health-care waste--commonly known as "the Blue Book". The original Blue Book was a comprehensive publication used widely in health-care centers and government agencies to assist in the adoption of national guidance. It also provided support to committed medical directors and managers to make improvements and presented practical information on waste-management techniques for medical staff and waste workers. It has been more than ten years since the first edition of the Blue Book. During the intervening period, the requirements on generators of health-care wastes have evolved and new methods have become available. Consequently, WHO recognized that it was an appropriate time to update the original text. The purpose of the second edition is to expand and update the practical information in the original Blue Book. The new Blue Book is designed to continue to be a source of impartial health-care information and guidance on safe waste-management practices. The editors' intention has been to keep the best of the original publication and supplement it with the latest relevant information. The audience for the Blue Book has expanded. Initially, the publication was intended for those directly involved in the creation and handling of health-care wastes: medical staff, health-care facility directors, ancillary health workers, infection-control officers and waste workers. This is no longer the situation. A wider range of people and organizations now have an active interest in the safe management of health-care wastes: regulators, policy-makers, development organizations, voluntary groups, environmental bodies, environmental health practitioners, advisers, researchers and students. They should also find the new Blue Book of benefit to their activities. Chapters 2 and 3 explain the various types of waste produced from health-care facilities, their typical characteristics and the hazards these wastes pose to patients, staff and the general environment. Chapters 4 and 5 introduce the guiding regulatory principles for developing local or national approaches to tackling health-care waste management and transposing these into practical plans for regions and individual health-care facilities. Specific methods and technologies are described for waste minimization, segregation and treatment of health-care wastes in Chapters 6, 7 and 8. These chapters introduce the basic features of each technology and the operational and environmental characteristics required to be achieved, followed by information on the potential advantages and disadvantages of each system. To reflect concerns about the difficulties of handling health-care wastewaters, Chapter 9 is an expanded chapter with new guidance on the various sources of wastewater and wastewater treatment options for places not connected to central sewerage systems. Further chapters address issues on economics (Chapter 10), occupational safety (Chapter 11), hygiene and infection control (Chapter 12), and staff training and public awareness (Chapter 13). A wider range of information has been incorporated into this edition of the Blue Book, with the addition of two new chapters on health-care waste management in emergencies (Chapter 14) and an overview of the emerging issues of pandemics, drug-resistant pathogens, climate change and technology advances in medical techniques that will have to be accommodated by health-care waste systems in the future (Chapter 15).
This Guide has been developed particularly for solid waste management practitioners, such as local government officials, facility owners and operators, consultants, and regulatory agency specialists. Contains technical and economic information to help these practitioners meet the daily challenges of planning, managing, and operating municipal solid waste (MSW) programs and facilities. The Guide's primary goals are to encourage reduction of waste at the source and to foster implementation of integrated solid waste management systems that are cost-effective and protect human health and the environment. Illustrated.
