Waste firm claims a first using Raman lab tech

CSG claims it has become the first waste management company in the UK to invest in a handheld Raman spectrometer. 

Traditionally, content identification of unlabelled chemical containers required they be opened for sampling and analysis.  The spectrometer enables accurate, through-barrier identification of hazardous chemicals at customers’ sites, without opening.

Dr Stuart Atkinson, head of CSG’s Lab Chemical Waste Collection Team, said: “We are proud to be leading the industry in providing a solution to our customers for this common problem by making the unknown, known.

“It’s inevitable that companies that produce hazardous waste end up with containers without proper labels, which can happen for many reasons including the label simply falling off.”

Raman spectroscopy has proved its value in hazmat response, law enforcement and parcel screening for explosives and narcotics. The spectrometer can provide rapid results on liquids or solids through sealed, clear and coloured glass and plastic opaque containers, or by analysing the chemical directly in an open container, identifying the chemical from an inbuilt database.

By scattering light from a high-intensity laser light source, it produces different wavelengths or colours to determine the chemical. Only chemicals in sealed containers such as metal tins present an obstacle as the laser beam cannot penetrate these.

Atkinson added: “We were recently able to use the Raman spectrometer at a university where we found 244 small containers of unknown chemicals. We completed the job in just three days, correctly identifying the unknown substances for disposal with very high levels of accuracy.”