Case Study

Bayer Recognizes Rhodia Eco Services for Waste Management Service

Bayer Corp. has presented Rhodia Eco Services (Cranbury, NJ) its Milestone Award for outstanding management of hazardous waste at four US plant locations. Rhodia received the highest overall rating of seven environmental waste management providers based on regulatory conformance, delivery, consideration, and cost.

"Rhodia is truly an exceptional supplier," says Christopher Hill, one of 20 employees who evaluated Bayer's waste management suppliers. "They know their niche and perform excellently."

Bayer also recognized Rhodia for minimizing waste generation at the company's Baytown, TX, coating facility by developing and building a system to handle higher-viscosity waste at Rhodia's Baton Rouge, LA, facility. The new line allows Rhodia to accept the waste with only minimal modification, and will save Bayer roughly $250,000 over a three-year period. The dedicated Baton Rouge waste handling system is the only one of its kind in the United States.

Rhodia Eco Services destroys toxic waste by a sulfuric acid regeneration coprocessing technique. Bayer presented Rhodia with its Milestone Award for outstanding hazardous waste management at four US plant sites.

Rhodia coprocesses pumpable hazardous organic waste in its three US sulfuric acid regeneration (regen) facilities. High-temperature regen furnaces, which operate at more than 1,000 °C, destroy the wastes in a highly controlled manner. The company received its first RCRA Part B authorization to handle hazardous waste in 1987.

According to Rhodia, sulfuric acid regen coprocessing offers several advantages. It achieves destruction and removal efficiencies (DREs) significantly higher than the Federal requirement of 99.99%. Rhodia continuously monitors every step of the process, since the same furnaces used to destroy industrial waste also produce deliverable acid. The plants are audited on a regular basis and fully comply with all governmental environmental, health, and safety standards, and the company has a RCRA Part B incinerator permit.

Rhodia accommodates railcar deliveries and has storage capacity for 500,000 gal of aqueous waste, more than 300,000 gal of organic waste, and more than 90,00 gal of special waste. It can handle most D, F, K, P, and U-listed hazardous wastes, including:

  • sulfur-containing wastes (disulfide oils, mercaptans, spent sulfuric acid)
  • acid wastes (vinyl acetate, corrosives, organic acid)
  • waste/contaminated oils
  • high-temperature meltable solids
  • OSHA-regulated wastes (acrylonitrile, benzene, formaldehyde, VCM)
  • aqueous mixtures (lean water, API/DAFs refinery sludge, hazardous waste waters and waste treatment sludge)
  • viscous organic wastes (tars, solvents, styrene bottoms)
  • chlorinated wastes with high-chlorine content liquids and tars.

For more information: Rich Jones, Senior Account Representative, Rhodia Eco Services, Inc., 5700 Northwest Central Dr., Ste. 100, Houston, TX 77092. Phone: 713-996-5413 or 800-521-2289. Fax: 713-996-5407.

By Alan S. Brown