WHERE SCIENCE MEETS PRACTICE

What happens when science meets practice? As always the human factor is important, but positive symbiosis is definitely an option. Actually, when it happens there are many examples of inspirational new developments in terms of essential problems being identified and solutions devised. In the 1930s, cadmium was identified by medical science as an element that is toxic to humans if they are exposed to it through inhalation of air or intake by food or water. Its effects can be crippling with high doses or cause fatal kidney malfunction with lower doses over extended periods of time. Polluted water from cadmium mining and the irrigation of rice fields created the first crippled victims (itai-itai disease) in Japan in the early 1930s. Subsequently the use of cadmium in industrial production revealed occupational health problems as a result of direct inhalation by soldering workers.

Environmental problems involving cadmium, such as food and animal feed contamination, were found to link directly to emissions from waste incinerators or the use of chemical fertilizers in agriculture. Studies between the 1950s and the 1970s which investigated cadmium pathways in the human body and in air, soil, water and plants, showed the way to limit cadmium pollution and use to an acceptable level. Furthermore, regulation made it possible to implement control programmes in practice. In very simple terms, medical and natural science met with bad cadmium practice in industry, waste management and agriculture, and that encounter created innovative thinking and a healthier practice for the management of cadmium in society and the environment. Lead has been known for centuries as a toxic element to humans, for example by causing brain damage if the intake (e.g. when drinking wine from leaded cups or tins) exceeds certain limits (detected centuries after the first incidents in the Roman Empire).

Lead was used as an additive in petrol to improve engine performance and it is clear that lead had been spread efficiently over land due to atmospheric transportation and fall out (wet and dry). Other sources of lead emissions to the atmosphere were combustion plants burning, for example, household and industrial waste materials. Even in remote areas the atmospheric pollution fall out was significant. In the 1970s, when it was scientifically documented that the major lead pollution of food and feed came from atmospheric precipitation (and not from plant root uptake) it became clear that the practice of using leaded fuel needed to be abandoned. At the same time other sources of atmospheric lead emissions, for example, from incinerators, had to be limited as well. Again, scientists met with practitioners and innovative solutions to serious problems were developed.

Phosphorus is an essential element for all life on planet Earth. It can also be a problematic pollutant if over-fertilizing of soils occurs or effluents are discharged into water-bodies that become eutrophic with excessive algae blooms, discolouring of the water and depletion of oxygen. Natural science can document the actual flows of phosphorus in natural systems and identify where imbalances are present or likely to occur. This knowledge can then be translated into new and more adequate engineering and practice, for example, in terms of sustainable fertilization in agriculture; new detergent products from industry; or new waste and wastewater treatment designs that prevent phosphorus pollution of land and water and at the same time reduce consumption of a limited natural phosphorus resource. Some of the contributions to these positive developments can be found in articles published in Waste Management & Research since 1983.

In 1986 a special issue was published on incinerator emissions of particulates and heavy metals and in 1987 trace organics were the topic matter. Not that these articles solved the problems, but they definitely expressed the joint concerns of professionals in practice and science. Advanced sampling and chemical analysis methodologies produced research results that helped industry achieve better in-plant process controls and reduced the emission of pollutants so that today’s incineration technology is part of sustainable waste management. Similar experiences are available from later Waste Management & Research special issues, on topics such as health care waste, waste prevention, and waste and climate change. In general, articles in Waste Management & Research have a scientific touch that increases understanding of the problem in question and often provides concrete leads toward preventive or remedial action. It is worth mentioning that both natural and social sciences contribute, as do humanities when dealing with, for example, social justice and behavioural issues. But above all, the coupling of science and experience is the mix that produces the most interesting articles and thereby advances in sustainable development of resources and waste management on a global scale. The International Solid Waste Association (ISWA) decided to publish Waste Management & Research in 1982 and some of the professionals and scientists of the then Scientific and Technical Committee invested much time in getting a good start by pushing colleagues to publish work in progress as well as acting as authors themselves. The initiation of working groups added to this science–practice symbiosis and helped ISWA organize exciting specialized conferences, and Waste Management & Research to publish the results of research necessary to make progress on documented (not postulated) evidence.