Re: Biodegradable Scintillation Fluids

[Sue Dupre <DUPRE%PUCC.bitnet@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu>]

The driving force behind Princeton's switch to the high-flashpoint liquid scint
cocktails was New Jersey's hazardous waste regulations.  Our radioactive waste
broker informed us that, in order to transport low-flashpoint wastes down to
Florida, the broker would have had to go through an expensive and difficult
process to be able to legally haul hazardous waste through the state of New
Jersey.  We could have made our own arrangements with another hauler, but our
liquid scintillation waste volumes are so small, it didn't seem worthwhile.

So we asked our researchers to stop using low-flashpoint cocktails and no one
complained (at least within our hearing).  That's probably because the vendors
did a good job of convincing the researchers they were being environmentally
responsible by switching.  However, we do not put LSC wastes into the sewer and
hopefully never will - we continue to send them to Florida for incineration at
a price not significantly different than the cost for low flashpoint wastes.

I appreciate your words of warning about the "safe and biodegradable" cocktails
but it would not have been easy for us to continue to use the low flashpoint
cocktails because of state regulation.

Sue Dupre/ Health Physicist/ Princeton University