Introduction

Laboratory waste management

Most of the experimental practices generate waste that should be managed correctly. One of the objectives of the Sustainability Office of the University is to provide tools to minimize, handle, store and dispose dangerous laboratory waste in a safe and environmentally friendly manner and, at the same time, comply with current legislation. It is everyone's responsibility to comply with these standards.

A management system for dangerous waste from university laboratories must find a balance between intracentre and extracentre waste management. The balance is not static and depends on factors such as legislation, sanitation network, treatment systems, volume of waste, costs, training and information of personnel, dangerousness, facilities and storage systems.

Thus, in certain cases, the same type of waste can be referred to an external manager or it can be treated internally depending on the factors indicated above.

Therefore, it is necessary to have special external waste managers and at the same time the capacity and the appropriate system to be able to manage a good part of the waste internally.