Coalition for Responsible Waste Incineration

When the public is surveyed for concerns on hazardous waste treatment plants, people almost always ask, "Will it harm me?" With continuous emissions monitoring by properly calibrated equipment, the public can be sure that hazardous waste incinerators operate within governmental regulations. The incinerator operator must prove to the public, usually in conjunction with a federal or state regulatory agency, that its emissions do not contain harmful or unallowed constituents. Continuous emissions monitoring and the standards behind it are part of the tools used to prove environmental compliance.

Under the Resources Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), the Environmental Protection Agency governs stack emissions from hazardous waste incinerators. The cornerstone of the RCRA regulations is the requirement that at least 99.99 percent of all hazardous constituents be destroyed or removed through incineration. RCRA also contains standards for cleaning up emissions of particulate matter, acid gas and metals.

Substances that incinerator operator may monitor in the stack gases include: carbon monoxide; sulfur dioxide; nitrogen oxides; particulate matter; volatile organic compounds and/or total hydrocarbons; hydrochloric acid; and metals.

The baseline data for monitoring these emissions is established first through a trial burn -- a highly controlled incinerator test. A contract engineering or laboratory firm usually runs this test, which involves compounds selected because they will be the most difficult to destroy. Based on the results of the trial burn, incinerator operators work with regulatory agencies to determine the feed, process operating, and emission parameters that will be continuously monitored. Where continuous emission monitoring technology are available, the incinerator operator then uses sophisticated electronic systems to monitor stack emissions. Researchers are devising improved equipment to continously measure emissions and demonstrate the environmentally sound operation of high temperature incineration systems. Specifically, technology is under development for the monitoring of particulate matter, acid gases, metals, and some specific organic chemicals.

Return to Technical Information

Return to Main Page