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Unidentified Chemical Waste
Chemicals that cannot be identified should be considered unknown hazardous
waste. Unknown wastes cannot be legally transported or disposed.
In order to dispose of them safely and properly, our waste contractors will
need to know as much about the material as possible and will then need to
test the characteristics of the waste. The cost of characterization
will be charged back to the department that generated the waste.
If you find unknown hazardous waste, please adhere to the following guidelines:
- Contact Steve Elwood at
258-6271 or Joan Hutzly at
258-6251 immediately to inform EHS of the material.
- Find out as much as you can about how the waste was generated.
This might mean getting in touch with people who are no longer with
the University. The more we know about the waste, the better we
can characterize it for disposal.
- Keep the material in your laboratory or work area. EHS or the
waste contractor will remove the material from your laboratory.
- Please DO NOT
- pour unknown chemicals down the sink
- mix unknown chemicals with any other chemicals for consolidation
- bring unknown chemicals to a regular waste pickup unless instructed
by EHS to do so
- abandon unknown chemicals in the work area
It is very easy to avoid generating future unknown hazardous waste by doing
the following:
- Label all chemicals in the laboratory in a meaningful way.
For example, it is fine to label something PIH as long as others in
the lab understand what those initials indicate.
- Dispose of spent materials and chemicals with no foreseeable use
promptly.
- Before moving out of a work area or leaving Princeton University,
go through the laboratory or work area with your supervisor or the new
occupant to determine which chemicals need disposal and to identify
anything that is ambiguously labeled.
- When relocating from one work area to another, do not leave any chemicals
behind unless specific arrangements have been made with the new occupant.
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