Types of Wastes and Their Impact

Wastes and Their Types

• Wastes are unwanted or unusable materials of no use.
• The Philippines generates at least 61 billion metric tons of waste daily, with 24% being plastic.
• Waste is classified into solid, liquid, and gaseous types.

Solid Wastes

• Solid waste includes garbage, trash, refuse, and discarded materials in solid form.
• Examples include plastics, Styrofoam, bottles, cans, paper, scrap iron, and other trash.

Liquid Wastes

• Liquid waste refers to waste materials in liquid form.
• Examples include domestic sewage, human waste, fats, oils, and grease (FOG), vehicle/machinery oils, fertilizers, pesticides, blood, body fluids, hospital waste, leachate, and wastewater.

Gaseous Wastes

• Gaseous waste is released as gases from automobiles, factories, or the burning of fossil fuels like petroleum.
• Gases such as carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons like methane, aerosols, and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) are included.

Sources of Wastes

• Households
• Commerce and Industry

Waste Classifications Based on Origin

• Municipal/Urban Wastes: Household garbage, construction debris, sanitation residues, packaging materials, trade refuse
• Industrial Wastes: Wastes from manufacturing and processing units (chemical, petroleum, coal, metal, gas, sanitary, paper)
• Agricultural Wastes: Wastes from farming activities (mostly biodegradable)
• Fishery Wastes: Wastes from fishing activities (found in coastal and estuarine areas)
• E-Wastes: electronic waste
• Biomedical Wastes: Solid or liquid wastes from medical diagnoses, treatment, and research.
• Radioactive Wastes: By-products of nuclear processes, or from industries not directly involved in nuclear activities (radioisotopes, chemical sludge)

Waste Classifications Based on Type

• Biodegradable Waste: Waste broken down by living organisms (green waste, food waste, paper, biodegradable plastics, human waste, animal manure, sewage, slaughterhouse waste).
• Non-Biodegradable Waste: Waste that cannot be broken down by living organisms.
• Recyclable Waste: Waste that can be reused or transformed into new products or raw materials (paper, cardboard, glass bottles, jars, rigid plastic products, metal containers).
• Non-Recyclable Waste: Includes plastic wrap, aerosol cans, batteries, ceramics, mirrors, incandescent bulbs.
• Hazardous Waste: Waste with hazardous properties, dangerous or harmful to human health or the environment (radioactive wastes, biohazards, residential hazardous wastes, including household cleaners, pesticides, and automotive fluids).

Impacts of Waste on the Environment and Human Health

• Climate Change
• Air, Land, and Water Pollution
• Loss of Biodiversity and Habitat
• Spread of Infections/Diseases
• Chemical Poisoning

Rocks Behavior Under Stress

• Rocks can deform into folds and faults.

• Folds are twists and bends in rocks.

• Faults are planes of detachment where rocks slip past one another.

• Stress is amount of force exerted per unit area in rock.

• Compressional stress: Force is towards each other and causes shortening/elongation.

• Tensional stress: Force is directed apart and causes elongation/shortening.

• Shear stress: Two forces directed towards each other, but not along the same axis; causes slippage.

• Strain is change in shape and/or volume of rock experiencing stress.

• Elastic deformation is reversible.

• Plastic deformation is irreversible.

• Fracture is an irreversible deformation where material breaks.

• Rocks' behavior depends on temperature, confining pressure, strain rate, and composition.

Metamorphism

• Metamorphism transforms existing rock (protolith) into a rock with different mineral composition and/or texture.
• Occurs at extreme temperatures and pressures (above 200°C and 300 MPa).
• All changes occur in the solid state (no melting involved).
• Two main types: Regional and Contact Metamorphism.

Regional Metamorphism

• Occurs over large areas subjected to high pressures (like mountain ranges), producing foliated metamorphic rocks (slate, schist, gneiss).
• Foliation is layers caused by differential pressure.
• Metamorphic grade describes temperature and pressure conditions experienced.

Contact Metamorphism

• Occurs near/around igneous intrusions, producing non-foliated metamorphic rocks like hornfels, marble, quartzite, novaculite.

Magmatism

• Magmatism is the formation and movement of magma below Earth’s surface.
• Partial melting transforms rock fractions into liquid.
• Magmatism can be triggered by decompression melting, flux melting, or heat transfer melting.
• Tectonic settings include mid-ocean ridges, mantle plumes, or subduction zones.

Magma Rises/Cools

• Magma's density affects its migration.
• Viscosity is the magma's resistance to flow, influenced by temperature, silica content, and dissolved water.
• Bowen's Reaction Series illustrates minerals' crystallizing temperatures.

Weathering

• Weathering breaks down rocks into smaller fragments/decays into other substances.
• Types: Physical (mechanical) and chemical.

Physical Weathering

• Physical weathering breaks rocks apart without changing their chemical composition.
• Processes include frost wedging, thermal expansion, exfoliation.

Chemical Weathering

• Chemical reactions break down rocks through chemical reactions, predominantly with water and dissolved chemicals.
• Processes include dissolution (rocks dissolved by rainwater), hydrolysis (water altering mineral composition), oxidation, and carbonation (mixing water with carbon dioxide to form carbonic acid).

Biological Weathering

• Biological organisms (plants, animals, microbes) influence weathering.
• Processes include root growth, organic acids produced by living/decaying organisms, and burrowing animals.

Structure and Evolution of Ocean Basins

• Ocean basins are bowl-shaped depressions with various components (coastal plain, shoreline, deep-ocean basins, continental margins).
• Continental margins include the continental shelf, slope, rise.

Plate Movements

• Continents are Earth's large landmasses.
• Continental drift theory proposes continents were once joined and have drifted apart.
• Plate tectonics describes the theory that Earth’s shell is divided into plates that glide over Earth’s mantle, explaining major landforms' creation.
• Major types of plate boundaries include divergent, convergent, and transform boundaries.
• Plate movements are driven by forces like ridge push and slab pull.

Methods of Determining Age of Rocks

• Relative Dating determines the approximate age of rock layers or events by comparing them to others, using geologic principles.
• Absolute Dating determines the exact age of rocks in years, often using radiometric dating techniques involving radioactive decay and half-lives.

Stratified Rocks

• Stratified rocks are horizontal sedimentary rock layers, visually distinguishable due to differing compositions.
• Strata are layers; beds are larger layers, laminae are smaller layers.
• Stratigraphy studies rock strata and their layering.
• Principles like Steno's Laws of Stratigraphy describe sedimentary rock deposition and layering.