The influence of some operating conditions on contaminant release from waste materials

Several leaching tests have been proposed either for regulatory or research purposes in order to evaluate the release of harmful constituents that may occur when a waste is contacted with a solvent. Leaching tests are dependent on a number of parameters, which are related both to the characteristics of the waste before and after contact with the leaching solution (pre-treatments and extraction procedures) and to the operating conditions maintained during the test. Investigating how such parameters can actually affect the rate and the extent of leaching is usually not feasible when performing a standard leaching test, which generally prescribes that a set of parameters be kept constant during the extraction procedures. Anyway, by varying one of the operating parameters at a time, the influence of each of them separately can be determined.