Work Description

Title: Unused Pharmaceutical Disposal Model Open Access Deposited

h
Attribute Value
Methodology
  • See manuscript
Description
  • Supporting Information for research article "Life cycle comparison of environmental emissions from three disposal options for unused pharmaceutical". This spreadsheet provides the calculations and values used for this study; please refer to the manuscript and supporting information (as text) available at  http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/es203987b for details about how to use this spreadsheet. We use life cycle assessment methodology to compare three disposal options for unused pharmaceuticals: (i) incineration after take-back to a pharmacy, (ii) wastewater treatment after toilet disposal, and (iii) landfilling or incineration after trash disposal. For each option, emissions of active pharmaceutical ingredients to the environment (API emissions) are estimated along with nine other types of emissions to air and water (non-API emissions). Under a scenario with 50% take-back to a pharmacy and 50% trash disposal, current API emissions are expected to be reduced by 93%. This is within 6% of a 100% trash disposal scenario, which achieves an 88% reduction. The 50% take-back scenario achieves a modest reduction in API emissions over a 100% trash scenario while increasing most non-API emissions by over 300%. If the 50% of unused pharmaceuticals not taken-back are toileted instead of trashed, all emissions increase relative to 100% trash disposal. Evidence suggests that 50% participation in take-back programs could be an upper bound. As a result, we recommend trash disposal for unused pharmaceuticals. A 100% trash disposal program would have similar API emissions to a take-back program with 50% participation, while also having significantly lower non-API emissions, lower financial costs, higher convenience, and higher compliance rates.
Creator
Depositor
  • skerlos@umich.edu
Contact information
Discipline
Resource type
Last modified
  • 02/21/2020
Published
  • 12/06/2018
DOI
  • https://doi.org/10.7302/t01g-7b18
License
To Cite this Work:
Skerlos, S. J. (2018). Unused Pharmaceutical Disposal Model [Data set], University of Michigan - Deep Blue Data. https://doi.org/10.7302/t01g-7b18

Relationships

This work is not a member of any user collections.

Files (Count: 1; Size: 1.25 MB)

Thumbnailthumbnail-column Title Original Upload Last Modified File Size Access Actions
Unused_Pharmaceutical_Disposal_v....xlsx 2016-03-04 2018-12-06 1.25 MB Open Access

Download All Files (To download individual files, select them in the “Files” panel above)

Best for data sets < 3 GB. Downloads all files plus metadata into a zip file.



Best for data sets > 3 GB. Globus is the platform Deep Blue Data uses to make large data sets available.   More about Globus

Remediation of Harmful Language

The University of Michigan Library aims to describe library materials in a way that respects the people and communities who create, use, and are represented in our collections. Report harmful or offensive language in catalog records, finding aids, or elsewhere in our collections anonymously through our metadata feedback form. More information at Remediation of Harmful Language.