We very often get inquiries as to what happens to these materials? This tends to be more frequent at the Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) events or perhaps from students trying to understand what we do with these materials. Set out here are an assortment of terms and descriptions as to how the waste industry manages the waste they receive from residents at HHW programs. (Please note that the procedures or process defined are general to the industry but may vary from one company or group of companies to the next) These descriptions are factual but are intended to be understandable to the ordinary person and should not be used as the legal definition, which may be used in the regulations.

The practical side of the waste management process is a blend of practices and regulations. Let’s begin with the Regulations, the provincial Ministry of the Environment of Ontario (MOE) Regulation 347 and the federal Transportation of Dangerous Goods.

Firstly, the waste materials are gathered together by the Generator, which is the name for the company with the wastes. They must be registered with the MOE before any movement of materials can happen.

The materials are required to be shipped and received by Ministry of the Environment of Ontario (MOE) licenced companies. This means the Transporter (i.e. trucking company) must be licenced by the MOE and the company getting the waste (the receiver) must also be licenced by the MOE.

Not following these rules is illegal and all the companies involved in sending, transporting and receiving the wastes can potentially be charged if these rules are not followed. As with all things there are certain exemptions for very specific materials but this is the general rule for virtually all hazardous wastes shipped from most industries.

The MOE controls this process by a tracking manifest system which monitors who is involved and what material and volumes are being shipped. Every shipment of hazardous waste in the province of Ontario is required to be manifested and the documentation forwarded to the MOE. That’s a lot of manifests. To help with this, the MOE has initiated an electronic manifest system – the first in North America. This internet based system can be used by companies that have internet access at their shipping locations.

The MOE also wants to know what is being shipped and to do this they have a series of “waste classes” which describe the materials. This information and the volumes are put onto the manifest form and tracked. Although there is more involved in this registering, licencing, and manifesting system the detail here provides a fair overview of the general requirements as set out by the MOE.

The second regulation referenced is the federal Transportation of Dangerous Goods (TDG) Regulation prepared by Transport Canada. This regulation, which was initiated as a result of the 1979 Mississauga train derailment, addresses what warning information is required for the goods being transported. This regulation identifies that trained personnel should be used and it identifies what information should be on the shipping containers, paperwork and the vehicles transporting them. The manifest is used to incorporate this information when shipping hazardous waste materials.

When Brendar Environmental handles these wastes we sort the chemicals by their chemical compatibilities and then put them in containers (usually drums) so they will not react with other materials. These groupings form the basis of how we identify the drum, label it, and document it for shipping. Our personnel transporting these materials are trained under MOE Regulation 347 and the Transportation of Dangerous Goods to do this work.

There are some other practical considerations when we handle these wastes. One, already mentioned is the chemical compatibility, but some other items include such items as the volume of the material and the capabilities of the company receiving the material.

Volumes of material: The hazardous waste management process is about “bulking up” volumes so that they can be processed efficiently. A facility cannot effectively handle many small containers from your household all put together so they are first sorted out into “like and compatible” materials. They are then poured/ scraped/ bulked into drums. Once many drums are collected, these materials can then be taken to another process facility where they can be “bulked up” into a larger tanks/ containers. Now, the large facilities can handle these materials with a higher volume focus shipping an “industrial” volume which is easier for the receivers to process.

Example: 1 litre to 4 litre containers of solvents for cleaning paint brushes
These containers are poured/ scraped into drums. After many drums are collected (perhaps 25-100 drums) the material can then be pumped from the drums with a vacuum truck. This material is now sent to another company that blends thousands of litres of similar solvents to make them into a consistent fuel that can be utilized (recycled) for its heat value in a cement kiln. This replaces using new resources while disposing of a “waste product” thereby using this material one last time before destroying it.

Although not all materials can be re-used/recycled in this fashion, the bulking up process is generally similar. So for materials like paint, oil, antifreeze, acids, bases, batteries, pesticides, fertilizers there will be some variation of this process for all these materials.

If you take this information as a general understanding of the “process” that is undertaken in the waste management industry we will have been successful in this educational segment.

Thank you for your interest in Brendar Environmental Inc.