I must still be on my hippie high horse after Sunday's Earth Day festivities...

Today the people in my department asked me if I would get us a set of glass basins so they could wash parts with acetone and white gas like they do in other departments. I told them flat out no. When they asked me why I told then that it wasn't necessary, there are other ways, and it creates an evil, caustic, and flammable slurry in the end for which we have no procedure for disposing of here (even though I know we're going through a couple gallons of this stuff a month).

What I brokered with them in concession though was that they could use the waste jet fuel simulant, which also acts as a light solvent, for cleaning gunky parts up. Once done it should then be dumped in the hazmat drums that we have specifically for any sort of fuel/oil product. This is 180 degrees out from other departments where I don't even what to know what they do with their waste products, last time I checked guys up there were still dumping grease contaminated sonic cleaner down the sink....

So yeah, crisis partly averted. It really kinda worried me since I know that my boss doesn't give a crap about that sort of thing, in fact I'm sure that if they went over my head on this they would get the green light. I don't think they will though, they saw the distressed look on my face when they asked me, so they know its more than me just being a typical dick boss. Stuff like this matters, even if it is just three people not dumping hydrocarbons all over the place. If you look at the fact that one-gallon of petroleum ruins like a couple hundred thousand gallons of drinking water, that’s pretty freakin’ serious if you ask me.


</Captain Planet Rant>