Hazardous Wastes and Waste Generation Factors Originating from Battery and Accumulator Manufacturing Sector in Turkey

Abstract

Background: Accurate and realistic data regarding hazardous waste generation is required to make improvements in the effective management of hazardous wastes. Battery and accumulator manufacturing industry is one of the priority industries which was investigated in this study under the project named “Hazardous Waste Management in Compliance with European Union Environmental Regulations in Turkey”. The project investigated a number of different industries for the development of an internet-based system named as “The Hazardous Waste Declaration System” in order to meet the requirements of Turkey for hazardous waste management. Objective: In this paper, hazardous waste generation factors were asserted by means of the type and quantity of the hazardous waste originated from the battery and accumulator manufacturing sectors. Method: For this purpose, field studies were conducted in an industrial plant operating in the sector, in order to determine all inputs and outputs of the current manufacturing process utilized. Concurrently, hazardous waste generation declarations made by the industries in the years 2009 and 2010 to the Hazardous Waste Declaration System were evaluated and a range of hazardous waste generation factors were created using the possible minimum and maximum quantities for each waste and the results were compared with the data given in the literature. Results: This paper presents the waste lists and the hazardous waste generation factors for the battery and accumulator manufacturing sectors. Conclusion: It is believed that the study will provide invaluable information for other battery and accumulator manufacturing industries from the point of types and quantities and the management of hazardous wastes generated.