testing fix on exhaustion

[Photo Engineer]

Great! I had not thought of using that argument. That is brilliant.

PE

 

[removed account4]

A sewage system whether municipal or septic is an aerobic reducing environment full of various sulfur compounds. Any silver ions will be immediately converted to silver sulfide. The solubility product for this compound ksp is 6 x 10-51. To put this in perspective the free silver ion concentration would be reduced to < 0.000000000000000000000001 g/l. Hard to get more insoluble than that.

hi jerry

whatever the solubility might be,
in some parts of the country
pouring spent fixer down the drain
can lead to fines, steep ones
( i am talking $10,000.00 /day )
whether it is a minisucle amount or a
giant amount, the powers that be
don't like it in the wastewater system.

sure, people put hair care products down the drain,
cleaning products all sorts of "stuff" but that "stuff" isn't
deemed illegal to dump down the drain, or not OK to
dump in your yard &c (im still amazed at people
who dump cyanide fixer in their yard suggesing it is OK )

i know someone who was fined for 10 days of being
non-compliant. even if he used your calculation
as his argument, he was still non-compliant and fined $100,000.00 ...

if people don't like the laws pertaining to dumping
silver chemistry down their drain, talk to local government
and state legisatures to get the local laws changed ... suggesting
people to break the law where they live really isn't the answer ...

 

[Photo Engineer]

John, cases like this usually get documented. Can you cite a reference?

Thanks.

PE

 

[Sirius Glass]

hi jerry

whatever the solubility might be,
in some parts of the country
pouring spent fixer down the drain
can lead to fines, steep ones
( i am talking $10,000.00 /day )
whether it is a minisucle amount or a
giant amount, the powers that be
don't like it in the wastewater system.

Where? I could not find any place.

 

[removed account4]

ron:

http://sos.ri.gov/documents/archives/regdocs/released/pdf/NBC/4249.pdf

and they enforce with zeal.
the person i know who was fined is no longer a commerical photographer
he changed professions about 13 years ago, maybe more. he was fined
for 10 days non-compliance in the mid 1990s when the commission was formed.

if people have a problem with what their local says can / can not be dumped on their property
or down their drain, they should take it up with their local governments. no amount of internet chat on multi national websites
will really do much to change local laws.

 

[Photo Engineer]

John, thanks. I'm rather amused by some of those limits (comparing lead to silver for example), but that is not a prohibitive list at all. You will find about that much silver in wash water (or less) and you can dilute the used fix to that level easily.

It would be hard to prove what was dumped down a municipal drain, and what you have given me is what they say they want, but says nothing about what was done to your friend. That reference would be definitive and would tell us how they determined the quantity dumped as one example.

PE

 

[Gerald C Koch]

There are several ways to reclaim silver. You can always add sodium sulfide to the spent fixer to precipitate out the silver, collect it and sell it. That should keep you on the right side of the Keystone Kops.

 

[removed account4]

PE

whether you believe me or not doesn't really matter.
i have no reason to lie.
if you lived locally in the 90s you would have heard every photographer
and lab owner and school with a photo program
talking about what happened ...
i wasn't local a the time, and found out from friends
and from the rep of the commission when i set up my lab
got my epa permit and hired a waste hauler.

personally, i think it is wrong to tell people to break
their local laws ... but what do i know ..


===

jerry,

t thanks for the information.
but i have other ways i remove the silver ..
(down to almost zero )

 

[Photo Engineer]

John, the actual case reference would be interesting information for me. I said nothing about disbelieving you. And, I said nothing about anyone disobeying local laws. In my post above, I stated that dilution would easily get you below the guidelines your references gave, and Gerrry gave a method for reducing Silver ion content to near zero.

In addition, I commented on how hard it would be to determine how much Silver came from one home in a municipality and my curiosity was raised over how this was done and why they did it in the first place. Was there a complaint? Did they have a die off in the sewage system? What was the value that was actually found? My curiosity bump got me interested in this.

If there is no reference, it is no big deal to me at all.

PE