Environmental Update (April 2009)
'Tales of a consultant'
Hazardous Waste
Recently, I was asked by a client whether they could deposit
cans of cured paint or resin in their general waste skip so I
thought it would be useful to include my response in this month's
e-bulletin.
This has become a common problem for many small businesses as
the amounts and types of waste that are classified as
hazardous/special have grown since the introduction of the
Hazardous Waste Regulations 2005 in England and Wales and the
Special Waste (Amendment) Regulations 2004 in Scotland. The
regulations also banned the mixing of hazardous/special and
non-hazardous/non-special waste as well as the mixing of different
types of hazardous/special waste.
As a consequence, this has huge implications for businesses that
mix small amounts of hazardous/special waste with
non-hazardous/non-special waste as any contamination renders the
whole load as hazardous/special.
Getting back to the question in hand, general speaking, paints
and resins will contain the properties that would deem them to be
hazardous/special under the aforementioned legislation. This can be
determined by referring to the Material Safety Data Sheets that
should accompany the paint/resins on purchase - failing that, the
presence of a hazardous warning label will indicate whether the
paint and resins are hazardous/special.
Waste that is defined as hazardous/special should not be
deposited in a general waste skip. It is important to
emphasise that paint which has cured and is thus solid, can still
contain hazardous properties, however, water-based
products that are free of organic solvents are not thought to have
any inherent hazardous properties.
It is recommended that a chemical assessment is made of the
cured substance (this may only need to be done once, if the
substance is used regularly on site). Companies should also
consider the guidance available on the Material Safety Data Sheet
(MSDS), speak directly to the manufacturer as well as consider the
age of the paint or resin as this can effect its hazardousness.
In all cases, the onus is on the producer to
ensure that the waste can be safely handled as
non-hazardous/non-special.