Waste Characterization and Reduction for the ChE 460 Laboratory Course

Abstract

Lab waste in the ChE 460 lab course at the University of Michigan was audited for three weeks, in which changes to protocol were piloted in the third week of the audit. Focused on reducing waste, these changes are feasible and recommended to utilize for other lab spaces. The changes put in place for two of the seven ChE 460 experiments resulted in approximately 30% reduced waste by weight, and have associated cost savings of about $350 total per semester. This lab course operates at full capacity every semester, increasing the amount of impact this project has on the university. Additional audits can be performed on the remaining experiments of this lab for even more opportunity to reduce waste. Many of the recommendations created in this project are transferable for use in other lab spaces with similar experiments. A broader list of waste-reducing considerations was also generated for use in spaces beyond campus labs.