[Pharmwaste] Best way to destroy collected Pharmaceuticals?

[Grasso, Cheri]

At our 14 retail pharmacy take backs in the Seattle/Puget Sound region (where they screen out controlled substances) the medicines are disposed at a Hazardous Waste incinerator.  They are able to use our state blanket contract for disposal of hazardous waste and it costs a little over $1/pound.  

 

The 25 clinical pharmacies are using a waste-to-energy incinerator.

 

Cheri

 

Cheri Grasso 

Pharmaceuticals Project 

Local Hazardous Waste Management Program in King County

130 Nickerson Street, Suite 100 | Seattle, WA  98109 | 206-263-3089

www.lhwmp.org

From: Pete Pasterz [mailto:PAPasterz at cabarruscounty.us] 
Sent: Wednesday, August 25, 2010 3:06 PM
To: pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us
Subject: [Pharmwaste] Best way to destroy collected Pharmaceuticals?

 

While there seem to be many approaches in the accounts/case studies of pharma collections from community events and from health care facilities, final disposition is usually not addressed.  If there is a mention at all in the collection protocols I've read, "incineration" is usually used without definition.

 

Questions:

1] What ultimately happens to the drugs that you collect or that are collected in your jurisdictions?

2] If incinerated, in what type of incinerator?   

                Medical Waste?

                MSW?

                Industrial Kiln?

                Crematory?

                On-site mobile/portable unit?

                Other?

 

Bonus Question-

For Air Quality regulators on the list [or one that you know to whom you can forward this], what are your State/Regional standards or requirements, if any?  How do they ensure that this process is ultimately safer to health and environment than landfill or sewer disposal?

 

 

 

þ Pete Pasterz, NCQRP

Cabarrus County Recycling and HHW

PO BOX 707 

Concord, NC  28026

704-920-3280

www.cabarruscounty.us/waste

If you're not for ZERO Waste, how much Waste ARE you for?

 

 

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