Isopropanol: safe storage and disposal

Keep bulk isopropanol with flammables, in a fire-resisting cabinet, in its original closed container. Keep what is on the open bench to the amount the job needs, as your DSEAR assessment will expect. Keep it away from ignition sources, and out of domestic fridges.

One detail separates isopropanol from most bench solvents: write the date of opening on the bottle. A twelve-month review interval from opening is used as a prompt to reassess stored isopropanol. That is a prompt for a check drawn from published peroxide former lists. It is not a supplier's expiry date, and it does not mean the bottle has become dangerous on that day.

Squeeze bottles need labels too. A clear liquid in a plastic bottle near a sink is exactly how people end up guessing.

Most isopropanol in use is turned over quickly and shows no change at all. The cases worth attention are old, opened, part-empty bottles that have spent years in contact with air.

Look for an opened date many years past, crystals or solids around the cap or in the liquid, a thickening or layering of the contents, and a discoloured or swollen container. Any of these means stop. Leave the bottle closed and where it is, keep others away and arrange for a specialist assessment. Do not test it for peroxides or open it to check. A very old undated bottle with no visible change still gets recorded, and it should be discussed before it is moved.

Water uptake and contamination are the more ordinary concerns. A drop in level with no usage suggests a poor seal. Cloudiness suggests the bottle has had something added, so treat it as an uncertain mixture.

This can form peroxides as it ages, especially after opening. Age and the opened date matter more than appearance, so a container with no opened date should be treated as old.

Review after 12 months: Review interval after opening from the cited peroxide former lists, not an expiry date from a manufacturer. Class C and all other chemicals are left null.

Isopropanol goes by specialist collection. It should not go down a sink or be evaporated as a way of removing it.

The solvents entry 20 01 13* belongs to municipal collections and is not the normal code for a laboratory collection. For transport, isopropanol is UN 1219, packing group II. Products containing it may carry a different UN number, so read the product's data sheet.

A lab that generates regular volumes should think of this as a stream and not as an occasional clear-out. Solvent waste collection covers that type of job, and keeps full containers from sitting in the store.

Expect part-used 500ml and 1 litre bottles, Winchesters in larger labs, and larger containers where a pathology department processes tissue. Clinics may have boxes of wipes or rub past their date, which are a different product and should be listed as such.

Usually held as: neat, 70% wipes and hand rub.

Part-used bottles and full containers are both fine. Tell us the size and how many, and an estimate is enough for a first price.