5.1 Medical/Biohazardous Waste Transportation, Treatment, and Disposal

LBNL subcontracts with a vendor to transport, treat, and dispose of all medical waste generated on site and at Donner, Calvin, and the Potter Street Facility. Only this vendor is licensed to transport medical waste off site. LBNL employees must not transfer medical waste from offsite locations such as Donner, Calvin or Potter Street.

The medical/biohazardous waste that is collected in the gray containers is autoclaved, and the pathological waste collected in the red containers is incinerated. After treatment, the waste is landfilled. Medical waste is autoclaved in some laboratories before it is put into the pickup containers. Autoclaving in the lab may be done as an added safety precaution or requirement in some cases, but cannot be considered final treatment. Medical waste must be treated by a licensed treatment facility before it is legally considered noninfectious. LBNL does not have a license to treat medical waste; therefore, all medical waste that is autoclaved on site must still be disposed of through the medical/biohazardous waste vendor.

 

5.2 Medical Waste Pickup Locations

Medical waste is picked up from the following LBNL building locations. Each pickup site has a contact.

The following table lists medical-waste pickup locations:

 

Location	Pickup-Site Contact	Extension
Bldg 73	James Garbe	6390
Bldg 6	Donna Hamamoto	5527
Bldg 26	Wendy Corr	4483
Bldg 55	Steve Hanrahan	6263
Bldg 64	Ken Wan	4456
Bldg 67	Bruce Cohen	6640
Bldg 70A	Stacey Gauny	5106
Bldg 74	Randy DeGuzman	6758
Bldg 80	Rosanne Boudreau	7076
Donner Lab (Bldg 1)	Amy Ukena	5987
Calvin Lab (Bldg 3)	Vangie Peterson	4348
Potter Street (Bldg 977)	Gregory Seaman	7834

Pickup-site contacts work with the Medical Waste Program Coordinator to resolve any problems with the management of medical waste in their respective areas.

 

5.3 Medical Waste Pickup Schedule

Currently, medical waste is picked up every Wednesday morning for offsite treatment and disposal. The Potter Street Facility has medical waste picked up on Thursday mornings. All regulated waste (anything in a red biohazard bag) must be brought to a medical waste pickup site on a weekly basis, before the scheduled pickup, and placed in a pickup container. It is necessary to remove the regulated medical waste and regulated full sharps containers from your laboratory every week, at the scheduled time, to comply with the California Medical Waste Management Act. Regulated pathology waste may be stored in a freezer for up to 90 days, but it is a best-management practice to transfer the waste from the freezer to the pickup container within 7 days.

You can usually wait to dispose of a sharps container until it is 2/3 full. However, if you work in a laboratory that uses red biohazard bags for the accumulation containers and you place blood vials containing fluid blood in a sharps container, then the sharps container must be disposed of within 7 days, whether or not the sharps container is full.

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