dispozal

Please NOTE:

These comments represent my own opinion and do not necessarily represent the official position of any local, state, or federal hazardous materials disposal agency.

You have a few choices. First, you can seal the thinner in approved containers and take it to your local community's approved hazardous material disposal location. By law, every municipal sanitation department must have a means for it's consumers to dispose of haardous materials.

Second, you can put the used thinner in an open glass container and put it outside to evaporate. While not 100% environmentally safe, it's better than simply dumping it down the drain or tossing it in the trash. There are a few other options, but these are the best two.

I just took our annual hazardous waste management course/refresher like a month ago.

The instructor said that the EPA basically doesn't regulate individuals. As an INDIVIDUAL, you're allowed to dispose of most things in the dumpster. His example was oils (i.e. from your car), though I would assume paints, paint thinners, etc. would also apply.

The more hazardous waste you produce, the more likely you would fall under EPA's purview, but most individuals don't come anwhere near that limit... A gallon of used thinner is OK to go into the trash.

But as Foster notes, your city, county, or state may have more stringent guidelines. His first suggestion is a good one, and I would probably do that if I were disposing of relatively large quantities. If it's just a bit (i.e. one of those 1/2 oz. Testors paint bottles or less), I'd put it in my dumpster. Soaked rags/contaminated paper towels... dumpster too.

Whatever you end up doing though, make sure you feel right about it.

agreed, here in my part of the Lone Star State they are stricter on the individual than the big oil refineries... go figure... we can't throw ANYTHING flammable in the trash (well, we can't get caught ) and it carries some fines with it too that arent anything to sneeze at.. (actually it's a quite lengthy list I found out as to what can and cant be put in that can)

way I figure if they want to sort through my 85 gallon city approved trash can to find a 1/2 oz bottle of testors thinner they deserve the money from my fine to pay the poor fool they made do that...

anything above that I either take it to the EPA site or leave it on the cabinet till my wife gets so tired of it she takes it for me...

In most areas of the country large home center/paint stores are supposed to have arrangements for disposing of solvent and EPA-sensitive materials. I'm guessing most would be happy to dispose of reasonable amounts of that sort of stuff for you...particularly if you're a customer. It doesn't hurt to ask.
Greg

Another option for the used thinner that you use for cleaning is to reuse it rather than dispose of it. If you have a jar containing dirty thinner, after a couple of days, the particulates in the thinner will settle on the bottom to form a sediment of sorts, leaving clean thinner in the top part of the jar. You can then carefully pour off that clean thinner into a clean thinner jar, being careful not to disturb the paint sludge in the bottom of the jar.

I use two old spaghetti sauce jars: one for "clean" thinner, one for dirty thinner. After the "clean" thinner has taken on a greenish hue, but is still transparent, free of paint residue, and has not lost any of its cleaning effectiveness. Using this recycling technique, I still have not yet used up a 1 quart can of thinner that I bought about five ago.