sf folks,
how do you dispose of your spent fixer? since i moved, i've been storing it. i cant store any more, i need to get rid of it. who do i call, where do i take it?
How much are you talking about? 5 gallons? Take it to the local toxic waste day. 50 gallons? Call a lab and ask what they do or consider removing the silver yourself. This can be done with steel wool or with reclaiming machines (electrolysis). Once you get the silver out, dump it down the drain or take it to a town with sewage treatment and dump it down the drain. Remember that all of SF sewage and street runoff goes right to the ocean. Nice.
i think i can answer my own question. the answer is, take it to sunset scavenge. they are in south san francisco.
free for city residents, up to 15 gallons per visit. open 8-4 thu, fri, sat. http://www.sfrecycling.com/sfhhw/facility.htm
The toxic part, silver, collects on the the steel wool after a period of time. That's how i've been doing it here for 2 years. Once the fixer is clear, i dump it and throw the silver glob in the trash. It's okay until you run out of space and steel wool.
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After you do the steel wool bit to get the silver out, combine the developer stop and fix. They nuetralize each other out and you get chemical salts. It is also the best lawn fertilizer you can get. At this point it doesn't hurt a thing to dump it on your lawn or down the drain.
What i find most amusing is having lived in Park City Utah, the drinking water right out of the tap has more silver in it than what I get out of my fix.
After you do the steel wool bit to get the silver out, combine the developer stop and fix. They nuetralize each other out and you get chemical salts. It is also the best lawn fertilizer you can get. At this point it doesn't hurt a thing to dump it on your lawn or down the drain.
Its also illegal so make sure you have someone to bail you out of jail. And uh..dont call me.
Not illegal. In fact the school I went to last does this all the time, located in Pleasant Hill California. As for the who told me about this, it was a chemical engineer who is also a photographer, named Bruce Barnbaum.
I'd be willing to bet that IF there is a single state in which dumping used photo chemicals on the ground is NOT illegal, that state is not California. I would be very surprised to find otherwise.
Contact any college and or university in California that has a phtography department. They take out the silver then mix the spent chemistyr and down the drain it goes. Unless it has changed in the last 6 months they still do it. Once the B&W chems have been mixed they are no more harmful than vinegar. Creating a climate of fear and false information on this will not change it. Pyro chems oxidize rapidly and once they have are inert. Color chemistry is another matter. That has some nasty stuff in it. Jason uses B&W chems. BTW I lived across the bay from where he lives near Berkeley. Now you want the ultra hyper paranoid environment that was it.
fix disposal in sf? 
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