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News

UH reduces waste, costs

EHRM, Plant Operations implement changes to save university funds, minimize toxic trash

by WILL RICHARDS
The Daily Cougar

Organizations at the University of Houston that handle waste have lowered their amount of disposal and cost over the past year through different recycling and packaging processes.

Chemical-engineering graduate Yurika Diaz Bialowas helped the Department of Environmental Health and Risk Management (EHRM) research which hazardous chemicals could be mixed together to decrease the amount of packaging material needed for chemical disposal. 

"You have 55-gallon drums of liquid where before you had maybe a half a gallon in a gallon jug," Robert Schneller, director of EHRM, said. "Under the old system, you end up with maybe 10 percent of the drum having actual liquid waste in it, and now, it's 100 percent." 

Schneller said that chemicals were not mixed in the past, and chemicals were placed in bottles. A company would package the bottles in Styrofoam peanuts and bubble wrap and then place them in 55-gallon drums contained would be sent to the landfill. Even though most of the drum was packing materials, it was still considered a 55-gallon drum of hazardous materials.

Now, EHRM employees who have been trained to handle these chemicals can safely mix them together, utilizing all of the container space and eliminating payment for packaging.

UH had almost 20 tons of hazardous waste before 2004 when EHRM began looking into ways to reduce hazardous waste disposal. Since then, hazardous waste has fallen to seven tons annually.

Even with an increase in labor hours needed for the changes, UH hazardous waste costs have dropped to $150,000 for fiscal 2006 from $200,000 in fiscal 2004.

Schneller said three other waste streams have been eliminated. Motor oil from UH vehicles is now given to a petroleum refiner; batteries from vehicles are given to a major battery manufacturer for recycling, and wet photography chemicals that had silver in them now have the silver extracted and put toward the costs of renting a silver-extraction device.

"The silver recovery unit pulls the silver out of the liquid, and when they pull the silver out, it's diluted enough you can pour it down the drain," Schneller said.

Reorganization of the Recycling Department has had an impact on the amount of solid waste UH pays for removal each year.

Patricio Sanchez, assistant director of Plant Operations, said in fiscal 2006 picked-up refuse was reduced by 30 percent and delivered refuse was reduced by 40 percent, resulting in approximate savings of $40,000.

"How (recycling and solid waste expense) connect is that when I keep taking cardboard and paper to dump, I'm paying to get rid of it," Sanchez said. "Whereas the other way around, if I start collecting (for recycling), I reduce the amount of times I dump and increase the amount of times I deliver.

"We save some money on the expense that we previously had and increased the money that we were getting for recycling."

Sanchez said recycling at UH has increased by almost 100 percent, over 450 tons, and income from recycling increased by 58 percent with lower market prices accounting for the difference in the two numbers.

The recycling program had a total income for fiscal 2006 of $15,000.

The biggest change with the recycling program, Sanchez said, is organization.

"There's a big difference between having just anybody's input and a single supervisor that says, ‘Here's the plan, if it looks like paper it doesn't go in the garbage,'" Sanchez said.

"When you stop and look at it, it expands into big numbers, and I still don't think they're big enough numbers; so we still have ways to organize."

A challenge facing the Recycling Department is storage space. Sanchez said that once it has enough room, plastics, pallets and toner cartridges will be recycled as well.

Johnnie King, supervisor of Solid Waste/Recycling, said that people are welcome to bring recyclables to 4211 Elgin. Aside from paper, UH also recycles aluminum cans, metal and automobile batteries.

"It's a blue bin that's sitting right up front," King said. "Students, whoever, it don't matter; I don't care -- paper is paper; we don't discriminate against paper. You, your boss, anybody, bring it."

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