Treatment of Clinical Solid Waste Using a Steam Autoclave as a Possible Alternative Technology to Incineration

Md. Sohrab Hossain, Venugopal Balakrishnan, Nik Norulaini Nik Ab Rahman, Md. Zaidul Islam Sarker and Mohd Omar Ab Kadir
Additional contact information
Md. Sohrab Hossain: Department of Environmental Technology, School of Industrial Technology, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Penang, Malaysia
Venugopal Balakrishnan: Institute for Research in Molecular Medicine, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Penang, Malaysia
Nik Norulaini Nik Ab Rahman: School of Distance Education, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Penang, Malaysia
Md. Zaidul Islam Sarker: Department of Pharmaceutical Technology, Faculty of Pharmacy, International Islamic University Malaysia, Kuantan Campus, Bandar Indera Mahkota, 25200 Kuantan, Pahang, Malaysia
Mohd Omar Ab Kadir: Department of Environmental Technology, School of Industrial Technology, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Penang, Malaysia

IJERPH, 2012, vol. 9, issue 3, 1-13

Abstract: A steam autoclave was used to sterilize bacteria in clinical solid waste in order to determine an alternative to incineration technology in clinical solid waste management. The influence of contact time (0, 5, 15, 30 and 60 min) and temperature (111 °C, 121 °C and 131 °C) at automated saturated steam pressure was investigated. Results showed that with increasing contact time and temperature, the number of surviving bacteria decreased. The optimum experimental conditions as measured by degree of inactivation of bacteria were 121 °C for 15 minutes (min) for Gram negative bacteria, 121 °C and 131 °C for 60 and 30 min for Gram positive bacteria, respectively. The re-growth of bacteria in sterilized waste was also evaluated in the present study. It was found that bacterial re-growth started two days after the inactivation. The present study recommends that the steam autoclave cannot be considered as an alternative technology to incineration in clinical solid waste management.

Keywords: autoclave; clinical solid waste; clinical solid waste management; inactivation of bacteria; treatment technology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/9/3/855/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/9/3/855/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:9:y:2012:i:3:p:855-867:d:16586

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().