A Hazardous Waste Management Solution for Bogota
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A HAZARDOUS WASTE MANAGEMENT SOLUTION FOR BOGOTA A Project Report Presented to The Faculty of the Department of Anthropology San José State University In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts by Andrea Arjona Amador May 2010 © 2010 Andrea Arjona Amador ALL RIGHTS RESERVED SAN JOSÉ STATE UNIVERSITY The Undersigned Graduate Committee Approves the Project Report Titled A HAZARDOUS WASTE MANAGEMENT SOLUTION FOR BOGOTA by Andrea Arjona APPROVED FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY _________________________________________________________ Dr. Charles Darrah, Department of Anthropology Date _________________________________________________________ Dr. Roberto González, Department of Anthropology Date ________________________________________________________ Dr. Hilary Nixon, Department of Urban and Regional Planning Date ABSTRACT The present work has been focused on defining a waste management approach that would enable the design of an affordable, socially responsible, and environmentally sound hazardous waste management solution for Bogotá. In Colombia hazardous waste mismanagement has become a great concern, particularly to main industrial centers like Bogotá where there is no public infrastructure to safely treat these types of wastes. Recycling and incineration are two of the most sustainable waste management techniques available today, though generally expensive to implement. One of the main questions addressed in this report was how to make recycling and incineration affordable and appealing to Bogotá’s industries. To answer this question the author proposes a strategic planning methodology for this project aimed at reducing costs and increasing compliance. First, to help reduce waste management costs, the proposed solution could design economic and service-based incentives that will help generators pay for hazardous waste disposal and other waste management services. Second, to increase compliance, the proposed solution could design engagement strategies that would help promote demand for sustainable waste management services. A flexibly oriented business model based on both market and network association forms could help introduce some socioeconomic incentives to encourage hazardous waste generators to adhere to the proposed solution. Cost-compliance problems and opposition to waste management facilities are rather common factors among hazardous waste management establishments. Building diverse forms of engagement through service use would be crucial, not just to help reduce waste management costs, but also to address opposition towards hazardous waste management facilities. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The completion of this project would have not been possible without the support and assistance of my committee advisors at San José State University, and the patience of my dear family. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Professor Chuck Darrah, for carefully directing, reading, and editing my work. I would also like to thank Professor Hillary Nixon, for calling my attention towards important literature that became determinant for the development of this project. Thanks are also due to Professor Roberto González, who patiently answered all my questions about how to prepare this manuscript. To my son and husband, thank you for sacrificing our time together so I could do this work. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 8 CHAPTER 1 Problem Statement and Methodological Approaches 29 CHAPTER 2 A Hazardous Waste Management Solution For Bogotá. The Contextual Environment 72 CHAPTER 3 Defining a Business Planning Approach That Supports the Design of Strategic Hazardous Waste Management Services 150 CHAPTER 4 Building a Hazardous waste Management Facility in Bogotá. Issues of Site Development and Urban Planning 199 CHAPTER 5 Using Anthropological Tools and Approaches for Designing a Hazardous Waste Management Solution for Bogotá 224 BIBLIOGRAPHY 241 7 INTRODUCTION This report discusses the question of how to design a hazardous waste management solution for Bogotá without creating negative impacts to the environment, to neighboring communities of waste treatment facilities, and to the local industrial economy. The industrial sector in Bogotá produces approximately 75,000 tons of hazardous wastes yearly, but the city doesn’t have the disposal infrastructure needed to safely treat these types of wastes. With a participation of 15 percent of the total national hazardous waste generation by industrial classification1 and with no incineration available,2 Bogotá has been accumulating over the years a vast amount of hazardous wastes in non-specially engineered landfills and dumpsites (Ministerio de Ambiente 2005:14). A specific service-based Hazardous Waste Management Solution (HWMS) will be proposed here for Bogotá. This solution should have the capacity to reduce local industrial hazardous waste volumes with environmentally sound practices, mainly through incineration and recycling (the solution is not intended for clean up of contaminated sites). Additionally, the proposed solution should be comprehensive (designed to treat all local industrial waste streams), affordable, and attractive for all ranges of industrial hazardous waste generators. If these conditions of minimum treatment capacity, affordability, and environmental sustainability are met, the proposed 1 Including mining, energy, electronics, agroindustrial, and the services sub-sectors. This solution would exclude the hospital industry, which in Colombia has specific waste management regulations and disposal mechanisms. 2 Except for a few privately owned incinerators or furnaces operating for individual use. 8 solution may ensure sufficient demand for its related services and increase its ability to succeed. The main difficulty for this project is that achieving a comprehensive, affordable, and environmentally sound solution for Bogotá may not be so easy to accomplish because environmentally sound hazardous waste management involves the use of expensive technological requirements (e.g. waste incinerators, filtering mechanisms, training etc.), which are typically transferred to hazardous waste generators through relatively high waste management fees. A comparative analysis between hazardous waste management approaches applied in different regions has shown that, even with appropriate regulation and enforcement, high waste management fees can affect some of the wealthiest nations of the world (see chapter 1). If hazardous waste management laws are not enforced and waste management is unaffordable, hazardous waste generators may prefer to keep on disposing or dumping their wastes at the most convenient location. To increase the likelihood of success for a hazardous waste management business in Bogotá this cost/ compliance complexity should be addressed from a project planning perspective. Here it will be argued that the success of a hazardous waste management business in Colombia will be largely determined by the balance of four main elements: comprehensive regulation, appropriate disposal methodologies, reduced waste management fees, and increasing levels of compliance. 9 The Meaning of Environmentally Sound Hazardous Waste Management To be designated as hazardous, wastes should exhibit one or more hazardous property including flammability, corrosiveness, reactivity, or toxicity (Basel 2009). These are wastes that in any state or form (liquid, solid, or gaseous) are “dangerous or potentially harmful to human health or the environment,” and therefore need special treatment, storage, and disposal (US EPA 2009). Beyond the principle of introducing special disposal techniques to prevent potentially harmful effects related to hazardous waste treatments, environmentally sound hazardous waste management is about waste minimization. The ultimate goal of applying environmentally sound waste management techniques is to help minimize hazardous waste volumes and waste production whenever possible. Founded on “an integrated life- cycle approach of waste,” this form of waste management requires strong controls to waste generation, storage, transport, treatment, reuse, recycling, recovery, and final disposal (Basel 2010). To protect both humans and ecosystems, specific waste treatment and waste minimization techniques should be systematically implemented throughout the waste management cycle (generation, separation, collection, recovery etc.). Waste treatment techniques would vary depending on the disposal methodology chosen (e.g. incineration, chemical treatments etc.), whereas waste minimization techniques could be based on the maximization of the re-using or recycling potential for certain waste streams. If waste volumes can be reduced through efficient waste management approaches (e.g. waste recovery or incineration) as well as through the introduction of 10 changes in modes of production to minimize waste production, it would be possible to diminish the overall amount of industrial hazardous wastes generated. Hazardous waste minimization cannot be achieved solely by a waste management solution that is partly based on recycling, specially because hazardous waste recycling or reusing opportunities tend to be either scarce or expensive. Applying an environmentally sound hazardous waste management approach in Bogotá would require collaboration between the proposed waste management solution, hazardous waste generators, and environmental agencies. This type of collaboration could help identify inefficiencies in waste recovery mechanisms or certain modes of production,