Disposal of used chemicals

Hi gang,

 

What's the consensus on disposing of used chemicals - developer, fix,

stop bath? Seems like just flushing them down the drain is considered

inappropriate.

The consensus is that there is no consensus, nor do the law, science, politics, and practice, always agree, or even overlap. The old wisdom was that everything went down the drain. If useage was significant, silver was recovered from the fixer. Today, you may have local laws that prohibit you from dumping anything down the drain. As a practical matter, the amount of chemistry used by most hobbiests is a negligable part of the waste stream. To be safe, you can recover silver from your fixer, and don't dump things like selenium toner. Don't know if you have any sort of hazardous waste disposal center you can use or not. There's also disagreement on septic systems. The old wisdom was that small amounts of photo chemistry did no harm. Kodak now says don't dump photo chemistry in the septic system. Again, it's a matter of quantity. Say you process a roll of film in Rodinal 1:50. That's 10 ml of deadly concentrated Rodinal in 500 ml of water. Not so hazardous at that point. Now you dump it down the drain into the 5000 gallon septic tank. Along with all the drain cleaner, toothpaste, detergents, and other stuff, that 10 ml is literally a drop in the bucket. It won't affect the system in any way at all. Stop bath is vinegar, so don't worry about that either. Again, the fixer is the stuff to worry about because it carries a fair amount of silver. Use it to exhaustion. If you use a lot, recover silver or find a hazardous waste center. If you use a little, don't fret too much over what you do with it.

Try you local photo shop. I know my guy takes it for any customers for free (provided you are not bringing 55 gallon drums!)and he goes through so much stuff that 10-15 extra gallons will not make any difference to him. And as he says its much preferable to dumping it down the sink which should not be an option you explore. I'm trying (hard)not to turn this into a green rant but the loading of chemicals on the enviroment over the last 100 years is so huge that we need to be aware of everything we pour down the drain. I know everything is dilluted into trace amounts but that excuse has been used for far too long and now we see fish turning up with traces of antibiotics and anti depressants in their system. Got a cold? Eat a fish! Get cured,take in some Omega-3 and loose the blues at one sitting!

If you do go the route of "down the drain" I highly recommend that you do not put the

fix down the drain. Try to find a photolab, darkroom, university, college, hospital,

anything that will take the fix off your hands.

You can gauge your waste by looking at how much chemistry you buy each month. If you're in the 55-gal drum stage, then you'll need lots of permits. But if you buy only about a gallon each month, you're probably OK with dumping it down the drain.

 

Fixer is all you really have to wory about. Silver recover from fixer (and fixer wash water!) is easy. just get a plastic bucket and dump the exhausted fixer and wash water into it. Then add a steel wool pad, available at Home Depot or any hardware store. Let sit overnight. The iron in the pad will replace the silver, leaving a grayish-black sludge, which is mostly silver. Add more pads as needed. When the bucket gets full, decant the liquid down the drain, being careful not to discard the sludge. Keep this up until you have about 2-4" of sludge. Scrape it out into a filter (large coffee filters work pretty good) and rinse with water. You now have a sliver enriched sludge - that you can sell to various companies on the Internet. You might even get enough to buy a bottle of indicator stop bath!

 

Alternatively, you could invest a few hundred dollars in a silver recover system that uses proprietary "iron wool" and sells you replacement cartridges.

Many municipalities have toxic waste disposal sites (usually at the local landfill) that will allow you to dispose of 'residential' waste for little or no charge.

 

Jim Couch

Kodak publishes a document that covers this topic. Their view is that as long as you are an amatuer, low volume user, and you are not on a septic system, it is OK to dump photography chemicals down the drain. This includes developers and fixers. Selenium toners and a few other chemicals should not be disposed of down the drain.

 

I think the reasoning here is that the capacities of modern waste water treatment facilities can handle such a small volume easily. Consider the large amount of cleaners, solvents, pesticides, and other household chemicals that are part of modern life and are treated by the sewer system in large quantities in all major cities. A liter or two a week (or a day) of photo chemicals is literally a drop in the ocean.

 

Read the publication and decide for yourself based on your situation and volume. The link below lists several publications, pick the one entitled, "Environmental Guidelines for Amateur Photographers," publication no. J-300 ENG.

 

 

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/corp/environment/kes/pubs/pubsList.jhtml

About the only thing that wastewater systems care about is the silver content of used fixer and selenium toner. Fixer is an issue because of the large amounts used in dental/medical x-rays and photo labs (lots of silver drops out of color film during processing). Many municipalities have regulations concerning fixer disposal (usually involving silver recovery), so check with them first. Of course, an amateur photographer would only produce a miniscule amount of silver in used fixer compared to medical/dental x-rays or photo labs.

 

There may not be any regulations regarding selenium toner, but it should be disposed of carefully at a toxic waste site. However, you can keep using selenium toner working solution almost indefinitely if you replenish it every once in a while.

 

None of the other stuff is of environmental concern unless you have a septic tank. Septic tanks rely on bacteria to decompose the waste that can be affected by many household chemicals and cleaners (and some photo-chemicals). When finished printing, I mix my developer and stop bath together and then dispose of it. This makes it even more harmless than might otherwise be the case.

<p>Oh, that all sounds nice and pious! I have been trying to find out where to dump my chemicals from my new darkroom and all I get is spin from those agencies that say it is illegal but how in hell are they going to find out if I dump a gallon or so of chemicals into my city sewer system? The government in my little burg poisons the water with Fluoride and I could die from that but they have no resources for disposal of hazardous waste! Besides I never heard of anyone dying from exposure to photo chemicals in the drain system. I think it is just an urban legend of some sorts. I tried and failed to find a way to dispose of my chemicals so down the drain they will go. I am just a small darkroom operator anyway. Minox variety. I did it 40 years ago in my first darkroom and I did a lot of developing then and down the drain it went into my septic system, never had a problem and I lived and developed my film there for 10 years!</p>