Heather, the best way to neutralize acids, is with Baking Soda, if you mix acids with Sodium Hydroxide, you will get a violent reaction, lots of heat and dangerous gases.
the baking soda will give off carbon dioxide, and as long as you are in a well ventilated area you wil be safe, they use baking soda for neutralizing battery acid spills in industry.
as for the laws, our government tends to ignore problems for years, and then tries to fix them overnight by passing the strictest laws possible.

I used to teach this subject for the airline I worked for, it is a requirement for companies in the U.S. with more than 10 employees,
here are a few facts that usually surprise most people.
1 every drop of water on the planet is contaminated with pesticides, not enough to kill a person, but nobody knows what the long term effects are.
2 the U.S. throws away enough aluminum cans to make a whole fleet of commercial aircraft every year.
3 you can run a t.v. set for 6hours on the amount of electricty it takes to make 1 aluminum can from raw materials.
4 the most dangerous place in most homes is underneath the kitchen sink, read the labels on some of your cleaning materials.
5 people die every day from mixing ammonia with bleach, it produces mustard gas.
6 fertilizer and oil are EXPLOSIVE.
7 Acetone (nail polish remover) is highly flammable, much more than gasoline.
PLEASE read the labels on the products you buy, and try to buy stuff that doesn`t contain dangerous chemicals for your own safety and the people you care about, there alternative products out there that do the job just as well without puting you at risk, and do RE-CYCLE whenever possible, you may think you are not making a difference but you are.

Unfortunately, at this time, I need the chemicals that are around my house.  I do have them stored safely so that they cannot get out.  Utah, as in most ways, is many years behind the times.  Recycling programs are not very good, and I have seldom (if ever) heard of any kind of program to collect hazardous waste.

By the way, I forgot some chemicals:  nitric acid, sulfuric acid, and hydrochloric acid.  Those are certainly nasty.  Believe it or not, I actually have legitimate uses for these.  But when I don't need them anymore, I would love to find a safe way to get rid of them.  The only way I can think of right now is to neutralize them with sodium hydroxide.

------------------------------------

Stevie, the proper answer to your questions is to use a balanced approach.  We should not ignore these issues, but we also must not go overboard and wreck the economy.  In the long run, that would be bad for the environment, since regulations would go out the window if people were starving.

Regarding one of your issues, I have heard of a number of cases of people being victimized because muddy puddles on their property were declared "wetlands" and taken out of the control of the property owner.  Many of these cases are ridiculous, but some probably are not.  If it is in the greater public interest to preserve a piece of private property, there are fair ways of handling it.  Private groups, such as the Nature Conservancy, use donations from their members to buy up private property.  Also, the government has the power of eminent domain, to take a piece of property and pay the owner "fair market value" for it.

Reasonable restrictions on property rights are appropriate.  Obviously, property owners may be prevented from conducting activities which would damage nearby lands.

Heather H.

We seem to be discussing everything else here, so I thought I should add this one to the mix.

Environmental issues are a big deal these days.  There has been much debate over global warming, energy, pollution, and public lands issues.  Where does everyone stand on these issues?

I am probably somewhat of a moderate.  The environment is important, but so is economic development.  To go to extremes in either direction is ultimately bad for both.

Human-caused global warming may not be fully scientifically proven yet, but many signs point to it.  We should work towards a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, but at a measured pace which will not destroy the global economy.  This goes for pollution in general.

We have discussed oil elsewhere.  It is bad for the environment and it is bad for global peace and security.  We must pour as much research money as we can into finding a substitute.

The western United States is full of lands which are owned by the federal government and designated for multiple public uses.  Most of these lands are administered by the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).  The traditional users of these lands have been the local communities, primarily using them for grazing, mining, logging, and hunting.  In recent years, outdoor recreation has become more important.  People from the cities love to travel to unspoiled wilderness areas.  Naturally, this comes into conflict with the traditional local uses.  These lands are federally owned and therefore belong to all of the people in the United States, not just the local communities.  Wilderness protection is an important value.  But the traditional uses must not be shut out entirely.  It is possible to come to a balance, making activities such as logging, mining, and grazing more environmentally friendly.  Some lands should be locked away as wilderness, but most should retain their multiple use character, but in a more environmentally friendly fashion than in the past.

Finally, I must bring up my favorite place - Antarctica.  Recently, there have been suggestions of using that continent for economic activities such as resource extraction.  That should not be done - Antarctica is too valuable as a scientific resource.  We can certainly afford to keep one remote and inhospitable place as an internationally controlled nature reserve.

What does everyone else think about these issues?  Also, what are the most important environmental concerns in Europe and elsewhere?

Heather H.

Heather:

We have HazMat days two or three times a year to get rid of stuff like that found in our cupboards. ;D We need them more often, but hey--it's a start.

Everyone:

Global warming? BAH!I don't wanna hear it. We have had the worst winter in SW Indiana in years, it's been cold enough to keep beef fresh outside for weeks. NYC has feet of snow, same for Boston and Philly, and they may have opened Washington National Airport by now. I've had friends and co workers stuck in Arkansas and Tennesee, because of snow. My folks have had two trees fall in their backyard (one of which took out part of the garage, The Momma's greenhouse and $1500 worth of orchids) due to all the rain they've had.

Global warming my foot!

Luv 'n hugs,

Jayne Sakura     
"Almost-Angel, T-Girl Genius, and Ultra-Flirt"

Heather, you may want to check with your Local solid waste authority, we have one locally that has a household hazardous waste facility, they will take that stuff off your hands for free, with no questions asked, just tell them you cleaned out your garage, I suggest you do this as soon as possible, some of the stuff you described is highly dangerous if mixed together.

We do have a lot of nasty chemicals around the house, and we seldom think of what happens when we are done with them and we throw them away.  Perhaps we need special collections of hazardous household waste.  I am sure we can all think of nasty stuff that is lying around the house.

In my apartment, there are a number of nasty chemicals which are probably not that unusual.  I can think of the following at this moment:  acetone, methyl ethyl ketone, toluene, turpentine, isopropyl alcohol, black gunpowder, smokeless gunpowder, motor oil, gun oil, ethylene glycol (antifreeze), sodium hydroxide (in pure form and in cleaning products), potassium nitrate (salt peter), sodium nitrate, batteries (with their nasty chemical ingredients), bug spray, butane, propane, gasoline, miscellaneous cleaning chemicals, lead, mercury, and, worst of all, chemical-laden processed junk food.

Just think about what is in your house, and I bet the list is as long as mine.  We need to have some way of disposing of this stuff besides throwing it in the garbage.

Scary, isn't it?

Heather H.

oops, forgot to tell you about exploding aerosol cans.

Hi all--

Heather, I'm with you. While we need to do something, it has to be done right, beacuae there isn't room for an "oops" here.

We get one planet, until/unless we can beat out (on a practical scale) e=mc2. Since mining the Moon or Mars is out as well (much less terraforming Mars), we need  to conserve and recycle when possible.  

Land use is a more tricky discussion. If we open up land for everyone to use, then it does not remain unspoiled very long. And, since corporations are nefarious abut restoration of land they've spoiled, I am hesitant to open more land up to be ruined used by corporate robber barons execs who think of nothing more than their bottom line.

They should leave both the Arctic and the Antarctic alone. The same can be said for the rain forests. Perhaps it is time we learned to do a little more...with a little less.

Luv 'n hugs,

Jayne Sakura
"Almost-Angel, T-Girl Genius, and Ultra-Flirt"

I think global warming is an indisputable reality. At any one time the planet will either be warming or cooling, geology demonstrates that. At the moment it is warming. All recent meterological records demonstrate that; the diminishing of Heather's belove Antarctic ice cap demonstrates that.

What is debatable is humanity's contribution to that. But that is irrelevant. The effect of global warming is likely to be more extreme weather conditions and (if my decades old geography O level means anything) this is likely to be more pronounced in central continental areas. So, Jayne, you can look forward to more severe snowstorms, more twisters, more scorching summers.

The consequences of these changes in weather patterns are unpredictable. We in the UK are contemplating the introduction of malarial mosquitoes. However that is small beer by comparison with Indian Ocean islanders contemplating the loss of their country. The worst case scenario (or is it?) would be mass population migrations.

Whatever the cause, humanity is going to have to manage in these circumstances.

The biggest pollutant on the planet? Humanity. In my belief, and I've no real evidence to support this, the planet is rapidly loosing the capacity to support the 5, 6, 7, or however many billion there are of us. I'm sure that if there were only 1 billion of us then the issues we have now would be nothing like as severe in planetary terms. Sobering thought!

Nature, has a way of re-balancing disproportion amongst her species. So expect the 4 Horsemen to ride out: War, Famine, Pestilence and Disease.

Warmest, doom laden, regards

Sarah

 
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/fashionlab/Images/Smileys/Laugh01.gif

There's quite a bit about the environment that I don't know, so this is one area where I'm still developing my opinions.

Obviously, we don't want to ruin our own home, but I think some politicians have a tendency to overstate certain hazards. This is dangerous, because if people cry wolf too often, they won't be taken seriously when we're facing legitimate hazards. I'm all for reducing pollution, because we all require clean air and water, but I question several trends.

Did we really need new air conditioners in our automobiles, or did someone stand to profit from the change?

Are we experiencing global warming? If so, are we humans causing global warming, or is it just part of the natural periodic climate shifts?

Should we bend over backwards to save every single species from extinction, even though extinction is a part of the natural order of things?

Should the government have the authority to declare someone's back yard a wetlands area and prevent the owner of the land from building a new garage because certain migratory birds like to rest on his property?