Re: Compacting radioactive waste

[wickland@middlebury.edu (Tim Wickland)]

At  3:38 PM 5/5/94 -0500, Dale E. Boyce wrote:
>As I remember they were getting a large volume
>reduction by just melting the carboys until they sagged.
>I believe they had to insulate the drum and were using heat
>lamps to provide the heat.

Dale:

Your story reminds me of the time I used to work at your very institution.
This was back in the 70's, in the bad old days when toluene-based scint
fluids were still being landfilled. A research group in the med school was
using heat lamps  to reduce the volume of the scint fluid by evaporating
gallons of toluene in large open trays. One day this residue overheated and
caught fire, making quite an impressive mess out of the lab.

Given the uneven heating charateristics of heat lamps and the lack of
temperature control, I'd be cautious of using heat lamps with combustibles
even in the absence of flammable solvents.