Economics of a multimedia approach

Journal Article · Thu Feb 01 04:00:00 EST 1996 · Pollution Engineering

OSTI ID:201157

Phillips, J B; Hindawi, M A

One of the major driving forces in the decision of a facility operator to implement a multimedia approach to examining pollution is the economics of the situation. A multimedia approach has gained favor with many facility operators because it has been shown to be more cost-effective than dealing with a number of phases, or media, separately. To a great extent, this is due to elimination of inefficiencies involved with cross-media transfer of pollutants. Even more basic to the problem of industrial pollution is the generation of waste. All industrial processes yield some percentage of waste products, but frequently during the design phase the costs associated with producing wastes are underestimated. As part of this series on multimedia issues, the costs related to manufacturing waste products are examined in detail. An obvious inefficiency associated with waste generation is the loss of material that potentially could be converted to salable products. The value of commodity raw materials frequently is ignored when considering the total costs of pollution generation at an industrial facility. Although the economics of pollution generation are affected by a number of factors, including regulatory costs, disposal costs and impacts on health and safety, this article focuses on the economics of lost production in industrial facilities.

• OSTI ID: 201157
• Journal Information: Pollution Engineering, Journal Name: Pollution Engineering Journal Issue: 2 Vol. 28; ISSN 0032-3640; ISSN PLENBW
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY
32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
ECONOMIC IMPACT
INDUSTRIAL WASTES
POLLUTANTS
POLLUTION ABATEMENT
WASTE MANAGEMENT