Waste Recovery and Its Environmental Impacts

The present article addresses the assessment of environmental impacts of three-layer wood-based composites containing waste from the automotive industry (incorporated in the middle layer) on aquatic environments. Water leachates from samples of the three-layer wood composites were evaluated using ecotoxicological tests with the test organisms Lemna minor, Sinapis alba, and Daphnia magna. In the samples, pH and chemical oxygen demand (COD) values were determined, representing the total amount of organic substances leached into the water. As a control sample, a particleboard without automotive waste content was used. The results indicate that incorporating automotive industry waste into wood-based materials represents one of the suitable methods of recycling such waste, and the use of biotests proves to be an effective tool for evaluating their environmental impacts. The findings obtained from the environmental impact assessment suggest the necessity to reconsider the quantity of waste incorporated in the production of wood-based composites to reduce the inhibitory effects on test organisms in aquatic environments while maintaining the physical and mechanical properties of these composites.