| ...fall into the following categories: |
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| The categories overlap a bit. No avoiding it.
You might have to read more than one section to be thorough. |
| Items explicitly excluded
here are all items
contaminated with any hazardous chemicals, with any nuclear material, with any items that have
ever been exposed to human blood or blood products or pathogens, and any/all items
which look like "medical waste." ASK
if you can't tell. |
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NEVER
put anything in the dumpster yourself unless it has been approved by the Building Services
Crew Chief or the Chem Shop. (In general the dumpster is locked until evening shift
anyway.) If you take items to the dumpster area, put them in the designated areas, not into the dumpster.
REASONS: All items -- trash, chemical containers, broken
glass, apparatus, equipment light bulbs/tubes... -- which go into the dumpster are to be
visually inspected by either Building Services or Refuse/Recycling, for a variety of
reasons. Also, glass tends to spray broken bits when the compactor truck compacts.
The Refuse/Recycling truck workers want to know exactly where it is, so they want
to put it into the truck compactor themselves. |
Whether
you will take anything to the dumpster area yourself, or will keep them in the room
until the custodial staff removes them (those are the choices), follow these guidelines: |
| Regular Trash: The regular trash is
removed from your trash baskets by the evening shift ( approx 3 - 11 pm) Building
Services staff (Custodians), and taken to the compacter near the east end of BRWN.
Your relationship with your custodian is important.
Items which may be placed in the regular trash baskets are items
which:
- are NOT contaminated with chemicals, biologicals, and/or sources of ionizing radiation,
and
- are NOT glass, and
- are NOT sharp (capable of cutting or puncturing anyone who handles the trash, and
- are NOT appliances
- fit into the trash receptacles
This "regular trash" group includes plastic or metal chemical containers if
they are empty, clean, odorless, and have a SFD sticker
affixed. Also see Non-Haz chemicals below. |
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| |
Sharp Things: Items which
could cut or puncture the refuse handlers, and which are not chem, bio, or rad
waste, do eventually go to the regular trash dumpster, but not via
your regular trash basket:
- Broken glass, Pasteur pipettes, TLC plates (clean and odorless)... should be collected
in a sturdy cardboard box or plastic bucket. Cardboard box
should weigh no more than 20 lbs and must be labeled "clean glass for
regular trash" or have SFD stickers.
THESE CONTAINERS ARE TO BE KEPT
INSIDE ROOMS (and out of the "walking and working" floor space),
UNTIL THEY ARE TAKEN TO THE DUMPSTER AREA. If you want your custodian to take out boxed glass,
follow the instructions given in C. below under Glass bottles and jars, and on the box
label shown there. The razor/needle container can also be taken out by the custodian
but you will have to call his/her attention to it. You may also take these items to
the proper location by the dumpster yourself.
But not right before it rains. The cardboard falls apart and the
Grounds crews complain bitterly.
- Needles, razor blades, scalpels, cannulae... -- cleaned chemical
and non-regulated biomaterials needles...(clean and odorless) are to be collected in a rigid
screw-cap container (metal or plastic, e.g. an old ether can or rigid laundry
soap bottle with a new label), and the container must be
labeled "CLEAN RAZOR BLADES & NEEDLES
FOR REGULAR TRASH." Do
not use the red "sharps" biohazard containers unless you have money
to throw away.
Dispose of these as Category 2 look-alike
bio-waste. pickup form: [pdf] [html] [Word]
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Glass bottles and jars:
- individual (intact) glass bottles/jars --
- Must be clean, uncapped, and odorless.
- Must be identified as safe for disposal by
- use of yellow SFD sticker on each container,
or
- defacing the original label, or
- boxing in cardboard box and labeling the box
with some "clean glass trash" label such as shown in C. below
- Must be kept in the lab or office (not in the walking/working floor space
and NOT IN THE HALLS) until the custodian
takes it/them out, or put in the the proper
location of the refuse/recycling area east of BRWN.
If your Custodian or your local Building Services
supervisor asks that the yellow label be used on the glass bottles or on
boxes of glass, please cooperate with this.
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individual containers |
- Very small glass containers can go into the broken glass
collection without SFD stickers; the
preferred size limit might vary with your custodian. If there are problems with this
please contact me. Do not put containers
(or anything else) in the hallway.
|
IF YOU USE ACETONE
or any other agent FOR CLEANING, RINSE WITH WATER AFTERWARD |
|
- Boxed clean glass, broken or not broken.
- follow directions on the label below and your custodian will take it out.
 |
|
Click on the box label link here for an rft file which
will print 4 labels in portrait orientation. Click on box label at left for a
standalone html version which you should be able to print from your browser. If that
doesn't work, shift-click on the bmp here and
save it to your hard drive; print it from a paint program such as PaintBrush. |
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Fly-away materials (powders, vermiculite, etc...):
Powdery or other fly-away materials such as talc, silica, and vermiculite,
should not be place directly in your regular trash basket even if they are not hazardous
materials and not contaminated with hazardous materials. The way they must be
handled differs from material to material.
- Unused but unwanted silica should be put with waste silica if you have a waste silia
container. If you don't have a waste silica container and it's a small quantity (a
lb or 2), ask a neighboring group if you can put it in theirs. Otherwise, write it
up on a chemical pickup request. See http://www.purdue.edu/rem/hmm/chemwast.htm.
- Other powders should be written up on a chemical pickup request as well, unless they
REM
non-haz guidelines say
you can put them down the sink. If they are non-haz but can't go down the sink, they
go to the trash dumpster, but
- glass containers are not to be put in the regular trash baskets, nor into the dumpster
by anyone except the refuse/recycling personnel, and
- any non-haz solid for dumpster disposal must have a label say its chemical name
and the words NONHAZ -- SAFE FOR REGULAR TRASH.
- Vermiculite (the crumbly, brown/tan solid used in packaging many things for shipment,
including between the bottle and the can for many chemicals shipped from Aldrich, Fisher,
Baker....). It is not by itself classified as hazardous, but it drives some of the
custodians nuts if you put it in your trash basket, and they don't see it, and it flies
everywhere when they dump your trash into their cart! (So why don't
they just remove the liner like everybody does at home? The expense of trash basket
liners is not the issue, although some custodians have said that they are reprimanded for
"using too many," or that they are "only allowed a certain number per
week." I hear that this is BS, and that the real reason is that it takes longer
to change the liner than to just dump the trash. I'm not sure what to believe.)
- If you have the occassional oil spill you'd do well to save verm in a labeled container,
and use it to soak up little oil spills. Pump oil, silicon oil, and mineral oil, all
of these can be adsorbed/absorbed with verm, bagged, labeled ("VERMICULITE AND MINERAL OIL -- NONHAZ -- SAFE FOR REGULAR
TRASH") and placed in the regular trash basket. Non-haz spills cleanups
larger than 3 L or so are best picked up by REM as if they were hazardous.
- If you have no need for vermiculite, you might out of consideration for your custodian
decide to bag vermiculite (and/or foam "packing peanuts" as well). This is
not a rule (not yet anyway); simply a coutesy which would take very little time.
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Appliances, instruments, equipment, furniture
- Anything with a PU Property Accounting ID number must be "Form Nined."
Chem Stores (WTHR 225A) is where you start with the Form 9 process.
- Refrigerators, freezers, air conditioners -- the coolant must be removed by the Chem
Shop before these can be discarded.
- Ask if the instrument shop (JAFCI) wants it
(if it's an instrument or part of an instrument).
- Ask if the Chem Shop wants it. They sometimes will repair items and give them to
some other needy research group, or might use them for parts (heating mantles, variacs,
ovens, ... all manner of items).
- Furniture and other large items which do not belong to Purdue -- they can usually go out
to the dumpster area but don't just take them out there without asking about it.
Chem Shop can usually help you coordinate with the Custodian Supervisor if you are
unfamiliar with the process.
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| Cardboard & other misc
Keep
it in the lab and alert your cusotdian that it is to be taken out, or take it out
yourself. See diagram of dumpster area
for cardboard recycling area.
DO NOT PUT IT IN THE HALLWAY, NOT EVEN FOR A LITTLE WHILE. This means everything.
Pizza boxes too. Hallways are not to be used for trash transfer or any storage
however temporary, even if your custodian tells you to. (They're not supposed to be
telling you to put anything in the hallway, either.) |
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| Non-Haz chemicals
There is detailed
information in the REM Chem Waste Guidelines Table III about what is
hazardous and what is not. Use that table to determine if your unwanted chemical is
non-haz, then either
Sink-dispose ("sewer-dispose") it with running water, or
Send insoluble non-haz solids to the regular trash with a label on the container
stating the chemical name plus the words
NONHAZ
-- SAFE FOR REGULAR TRASH. No glass containers are to be placed in
your trash basket, so unless it's in a plastic or metal container, it has to go out
separately to the pavement next to the dumpster (see area "B") via your custodian or
yourself. |
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