Laboratory Recycling at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Paul Smith, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Sandra Martin, MT (ASCP), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC's) Laboratory Recycling Program began as a pilot project in 2008. The purpose of the pilot was to demonstrate the feasibility of recycling plastics from a laboratory setting. The program included the coordination of laboratory leadership, laboratory staff, custodians, the Office of Health, Safety and Environment, and Emory Recycling. A total of 32 laboratorians comprised the laboratory pilot team, including 15 members of the microbial pathogenesis and immune response laboratory and 17 members from the immunology laboratory. The pilot has successfully diverted several tons of plastics from entering the landfill. Expansion is currently in progress, with the goal of opening laboratory recycling to other qualifying laboratories at CDC.
Recycling needs of laboratory materials differ from commonly recyclable items, in that laboratory materials can be utilized in a potentially hazardous environment. The flasks, pipette tip boxes, plastic reagent containers, and other plastic items marked type one through six that hold their shape must first be decontaminated before they can be recycled. Formal procedures for segregation responsibilities were developed for laboratorians and for the laboratory support staff, while pick-up and delivery responsibilities were developed for Office of Safety, Health and Environment staff. The recycling contractor, Emory Recycling, had to be confident that the plastics that they were receiving were not hazardous. CDC, the laboratorians, and the recyclers were all responsible for the safety of the laboratory materials now entering the recycling stream.
Results from the pilot show that approximately 6.7 percent per laboratory floor of the solid laboratory waste is being diverted. In the first 16 months of the program, 13,700 pounds of plastics were diverted. This program will soon be expanded to other qualifying laboratories. Traditionally, containers that had previously held hazardous materials were thought too difficult or dangerous to recycle. Scientists at CDC closely examined the waste stream from their laboratories and created a protocol to lessen the impact these laboratories have on the environment. The pilot program shows environmental leadership by going beyond what is required for compliance in waste disposal. Additionally, the program has successfully navigated many safety concerns throughout the recycling of these particular materials. The procedures that CDC has created allow others to replicate this program and therefore divert an even larger amount of materials from the waste stream.
Biographies:
Paul Smith serves as a sustainability specialist in the Office of Sustainability at CDC. Mr. Smith's responsibilities include sustainable projects in the areas of laboratory operations, information technology, and green purchasing. Following 12 years in the financial services industry, Mr. Smith came to CDC in 2010 to use his finance background to evaluate sustainable projects.
Sandra Martin is the quality assurance team leader at CDC. Ms. Martin's previous background includes work as a medical technologist in clinical laboratories and work in a vaccine production facility. Ms. Martin was instrumental in overseeing the start-up of a microbial pathogenesis and immune response laboratory in 2001, shortly before the anthrax outbreaks occurred. Ms. Martin began CDC's plastics recycling program in 2008 in response to the large amounts of plastics generated from a clinical trial study in her laboratory. The program has expanded from a pilot program to now include parts of two Atlanta CDC campuses, and has seen measurable results.