STORAGE/DISPOSAL > Overview

One of the most challenging environmental regulatory compliance issues facing laboratories is the generation, storage and disposal of waste. Compared to many industrial facilities, medical labs tend to produce smaller amounts of a wider variety of waste types. All of these wastes must be collected, classified, labelled, stored and disposed of, and these activities must be handled in accordance with regulations.

Typically, medically laboratories generate, store and dispose of solid and hazardous waste-and, in some cases, radioactive and mixed waste. Radioactive wastes are regulated by the Radioactive Substances Act 1993. Mixed waste-that is, waste that exhibits characteristics of both hazardous and radioactive waste-must be managed under both Hazardous and Radioactive Waste Regulations.

Although most states and other local agencies have issued regulations regarding the disposal of medical and infectious wastes, there are very few federal regulations that do so. You'll find coverage of these issues of their own section of the EVC.

Hazardous and non-hazardous solid waste is regulated by the Environment Agency, whose overall intent is to manage this waste from generation to ultimate disposal. This "cradle-to-grave" approach has resulted in regulations governing hazardous waste generators, transporters and TSD (treatment, storage and disposal) facilities. Given that most university facilities do not themselves transport hazardous waste to an off-site hazardous waste disposal facility, treat hazardous waste, or operate a hazardous waste disposal facility, the regulations governing these activities are not addressed in the EVC. More typically, your facility would generate, store the waste and then have a contractor transport the waste off site for disposal. The specific hazardous waste management requirements a facility must follow depend on the facility's generator status and the types of waste it produces. In other words, the generator status of the college or university will determine the type of requirements individual departments may need to follow.

Not only is hazardous waste management one of the most common environmental issues at college and university campuses, but the specific requirements for hazardous waste are so numerous, the EVC has, as appropriate, split the content into three areas as follows:

• Storage/Disposal
• Record keeping
• Training/Other

Continue further along the EVC tour and learn more about storage/disposal requirements.