ABSTRACT
This chapter covers commonly used techniques to detect lead, chromium, and cadmium in spent abrasive and methods for disposing of abrasive contaminated with lead-based paint (LBP) chip or dust. Several techniques for determining toxic metals in paint are AA and ICP-AES methods and EDX-SEM. Toxicity characteristic leaching procedure (TCLP) is the method mandated by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for determining how much toxic material is likely to leach out of solid wastes. The approaches used in the chapter to minimize the volume of hazardous debris are physical separation, burning off the innocuous parts, acid extraction and then precipitation of the metals. The major stabilization process are with iron, pH adjustment, calcium silicate and other additives. The University of Texas at Austin has done a large amount of research on treatment of spent abrasive media by Portland cement, that are discussed in the chapter.
