Chemistry disposal? What do folks actually do with spent chemistry?

I was recently hired at a college-- darkroom has a silver recovery unit. That's where my stuff will now be going. If you are near the Woodlands, I'll dump your old fixer there too, Bill.

Everything all of you said is very nice, but there is a problem. There are large number of countries who have no facilities for deal with photographic chemistry. For example, in my country I can't give my used chemistry to anyone, there are no service who do that job. So, whatever I think or want to do my only option is to throw away through sewer.

Well, actually, here in Canada, we have "household hazardous waste facilities". Drop off points for paint, motor oil, chemicals, etc. Funny bit is, they don't know what to do with all this stuff either! When the depots fill up, they landfill the lot. We go through the motions, however, and everyone thinks they are being 'green'.

>>>So, bottom line - keep the silver out of the drain.<<<

Does that include rinsing prints where the water goes down the drain?

Absinthe said:

If you just evaporate it outside can you just dispose the solid in household trash? (bit sewer)

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Does anyone else think the evaporating to solid is a bad idea? Once the chemcials become a solid you risk breathing the dust in while handling them. Or wandering family pets, birds, children and other critters being harmed by coming in contact with them.

The simple, and correct, answer is that dilution is indeed the solution to pollution. Why do you think that the EPA et al. measure pollution and toxicity in terms of parts per thousand, million, billion, etc. I mean, use common sense, please.

When you dump your chemistry down the local sewer, you not only mix it with water you rinse down the drain, but also with your neighbor flushing her toilet, the guy down the street in the shower, etc.

I know I haven't been in these forums long, and I haven't spent too much time working with darkroom chemistry. But my dad is one of the preeminent Industrial Hygienists in the nation (he has, at separate times, been head of both national orignizations), so I know quite a bit about pollution and hobbies in general. I can tell you with complete confidence that your one-shot developing and fixing chemicals are NOTHING compared with the GALLONS and GALLONS of chemistry a full-blown lab uses every day; let's also not forget that these labs typically renew their developing and fixing chemistry, so the resulting slurry is even MORE toxic and requires even more dilution. If you are honestly that bothered by what you might be doing to the environment, be sure to only every use your chemistry as one shot (especially your fixer). That will essentially guarantee that your chemistry will safely dilute out in the municipal sewer system.

How do all you people who demand that every one goes to a "waste facility" think that the waste facility people dispose of the chemicals? Yes, they have some equipment to help neutralize the toxicity, but mostly they have very controlled, well-researched ways of dilluting and disposing of your chemicals. You're already pretty hard-core "do-it-yourself" if you're developing your own chemistry; why all of a sudden do people who can master an arcane chemistry process over a century old feel as though they cannot solve environmental issues without always running to nanny government?

I also wanted to point out that we, as film developers, can work with a clearer conscious about pollution now then we could at any other point in history. Think about it: in this digital world, people who develop their own film represent a niche within a niche (people who use film who develop their own film). Compared with the 60's and 70's, when manufacturers made NO attempt to mitigate the toxicity of their chemistry, and when film was the ONLY way to get an image--professional or amateur--we produce a mere fraction of the pollution. Development based pollution is a smaller fraction of the total pollution now then it has been since the beginning of photography itself.

Most of the real pollution produced by photography these days comes from the manufacture of CMOS chips, and that is the domain of companies and governments and regulations. I know here in San Diego, unless you are commercially developing film for other people, the local authorities aren't interested in your level of "pollution," even if you shoot film professionally. California is one of the most environmentally-conscious states in America, I might add.

Do any of you own SUVs? If you own an SUV and you develop your own chemistry, guess which is causing a bigger problem, environmentally? Sure, film chemistry is toxic and pollutes, but lets do have some perspective on modern society in general.

jgcull said:

>>>So, bottom line - keep the silver out of the drain.<<<

Does that include rinsing prints where the water goes down the drain?

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That's not enough to make a difference in the grand scheme of things.

thebdt:

Hmm, perspective. Nicely summarized.

David William White said:

thebdt:

Hmm, perspective. Nicely summarized.

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I agree, the most sensible post in this thread so far.

thebdt:

Great well thought out post/argument/POV---

When I was getting back into photography/darkroom stuff I wondered what I was going to do with my waste. I have a background in environmental geology ground water contamination clean up (before I got smart and became a Firefighter). I did the research on the photo chems, and in the volumes I use they are not bad. If you think about all the crap that goes down the drain--tub cleaners, drain unclogger, soaps, detergents, antibacterial stuff, and other. Photo stuff ain't bad. So I dump it all used fixer too. I figure I develop 10-15 rolls of film and 25-30 8X20 picture a month, in the grand scheme of things NOT THAT MUCH

jgcull said:

>>>So, bottom line - keep the silver out of the drain.<<<

Does that include rinsing prints where the water goes down the drain?

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I'd be interested in the opinions of people with degrees in chemistry, but as far as I've seen, used fixer is the only solution with any significant silver content. Wash water has very little silver content. Silver is dissolved by the fixer from the film and prints and accumulates in the used fixer. If you use the various ways of dealing with the silver in fixer that have been amply detailed in other threads, you have done all you need to with common BW processing. My comment here refers to small volume processing. Big commercial labs may have more work needed to do the right thing.

C

Well let's see what else is going down the drain: an assortment of pharmaceuticals, a little jet fuel, and to think that there are people looking into our shit to find this stuff is even more amazing.

So I think there are a few other things our nanny government has to worry about. But please, whatever you do, please do not dump you used fixer down the storm drain, that's all I ask. There, I've done my green deed for the day.

BTW my day job is greatly influenced by the Clean Water Act.

Terry

I live in Manhattan and from what I was told, our waste ends up on the Jersey Shore.

I have been disposing of my chemicals by dumping them all (dev, stop, fixer) into a bucket and then once a month taking them down to the local recycling agency. Since I have a well and septic, I am hesitant to dump these down the drain... maybe I am being too cautious with the XTOL, Dektol and stop bath, but anyway...

Now for my question... The recycling agency is closed till spring and I am collecting chemicals at a rate of 4-5 gal / month. Rather than storing all this solution, I started evaporating the solution using a propane burner and a pot to get the 5 gallons down to a quart or so, and then store that. I evaporate the liquid outside and I live in the boonies so my impression is that this is safe. However, I would appreciate some feedback if someone knows this to be a problem.

Thanks in advance,
Jim

just in case folks who use selenium think it is OK to pour that down the drain as well


http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=39194


the effects are very much like getting radiation poisioning ....

jnanian said:

just in case folks who use selenium think it is OK to pour that down the drain as well


http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=39194


the effects are very much like getting radiation poisioning ....

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But wouldn't the toner normally be depleted or nearly so before one threw it away?

Evaporation sounds like kinda a bad idea to me. Doesn't that mean you are taking a liquid solution that is relatively safe and turning it back into a powder solution that can get into the air and blow around everywhere? Then the powder can hit water in the rain and dew and become super concentrated. Of course if it's your backyard and that's fine with you I guess that's no problem.

Well, it never gets into a powder form, I think I am evaporating the water from the solution and then creating a concentrated liquid that then goes to the recycling agency. Just makes it easier to store. I am wondering from the more knowledgeable members of the forum if the heating just evaporates the water or is the chemical going with it. As an experiment, I did evaporate one time to the dry chemical and I had roughly the same volume as the starting raw powder. Not very quantitative, but visually looked the same.

Chazzy said:

But wouldn't the toner normally be depleted or nearly so before one threw it away?

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THAT is a good question ... how do you know when it IS depleted?

and after you use it, do you wash selenium toned prints and films and trays and let the wash water go down
the drain?

i never use the stuff ... so i wouldn't know how to begin to answer these questions ...

do you?

I have always dumped the stop bath, hypo clear, and photo flo down the drain. One shot dev like HC-110 and D-76 (1+1) also go down the drain. However, I reuse fixer and most developers until quite exhausted or they look so bad that I cannot bear to put film in them any longer. These I pour out into a large bucket in the garage - out of reach of childeren - where I let the liquids evaporate off. So far, that's it. I guess one day, I'll have to deal with the solids that fall out of solution. When I do, I'll take it to the HazMat waste place across town or ask my chemistry friends to help recover the silver...and we'll be stinking rich!

After reading this, I wonder if the evaporation station is a litttle too cavalier? I always kinda assumed that just water was evaporating off so, it was OK.

I take my spent fixer to the local waste management facility in Berlin, this is free for amateur users (if you have a professional lab you have to pay to dispose of chemicals properly and be able to prove that you have done so). We can all argue about how much silver is truly damaging to the environment in comparison to other household chemicals and other pollutants, but if your local community offers a reasonably convenient way to dispose of such things safely then I can see no reason not to take advantage of that.

jnanian said:

THAT is a good question ... how do you know when it IS depleted?

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Maybe when it no longer works?

Chazzy said:

Maybe when it no longer works?

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when you wash your prints and film and selenium -tray/tank
there is probably non- depleted toner there ...

do you put it down the drain?
do you dispose of it another way ?

I ended up calling my local EPA field office regarding the disposal of photographic chemicals. First of all, he was not impressed with my idea of boiling down the chemicals... surprise, surprise ) Mainly, mixing up chemicals and then bringing up to very high concentrations.

Anyhoo... we then talked about how to dispose of the chemicals, his first suggestion was to take them all to the local recycling "days" where I could dispose of them. Since I was planning on doing this anyhow, I was in agreement. But then I asked about what chemicals I could safely pour down the drain. No surprise he said photo-flo and stop bath if well diluted. Fixer was next and was a definite no-no since I have a septic system. As has been stated here many times, silver will kill the bacteria in the tank. Even if I did the steel wool treatment, which he said was quite effective, it was still no-go.

Finally we talked about the developer. He had a concern dumping this down the drain, but it was not the chemical per se. This he said biodegraded quickly and would not be seen in the water supply (aqua-firs). He was concerned that there was silver in the developer, a by-product of the development process. He said that he has a long-standing debate with his neighbor, an avid photographer, on this matter. He admitted that his neighbor has been dumping the developer down the drain for years and has not had a problem.

To be a bit more scientific on this, I said that I would look into the cost of getting the silver tested in my developer. If reasonable, I will assemble two samples. One will be 500ml of XTOL 1+1 after developing a roll of 120 film (Plus-X in my case). Second sample will be Dektol after a week's worth of prints. After I get the results we can then calculate the concentration of silver in the tank, Assume 5 rolls/week (2.5L XTOL 1+1) and 1/2 gal Dektol / week and account for my getting the tank pumped every 3 years and get a maximum silver concentration. He can then find out what the effect will be. I suspect the silver concentration in the developer will be quite low and this would be a non-issue, but would be interesting to see for peace of mind. Anyone have any idea what the PPM of silver in the developer would be after developing a roll of film?

Regards,
Jim