How to deal with hazardous waste generated in the laboratory? This issue has become a common challenge faced by many universities in East China. On the one hand, it is illegal for schools to dispose of hazardous waste generated in laboratories on their own; On the other hand, it is not easy to find suitable hazardous waste disposal units. Due to the fact that hazardous waste has become a scarce resource in reality, with deposits of tens of thousands of yuan and high processing costs, many hazardous waste generating units are deterred.

Why can hazardous waste treatment units dominate the market? The author believes that the fundamental reason is the serious lack of hazardous waste disposal capacity, which leads to a mismatch between market supply and demand.

Firstly, various regions have long attached great importance to the construction of environmental protection infrastructure such as sewage treatment plants and domestic waste landfills, but have not given enough attention and investment to the centralized disposal of hazardous waste.

The second is that hazardous waste has long been licensed and requires multiple levels of approval. At present, although some places have delegated the approval authority for comprehensive utilization projects of hazardous waste, the additional requirements are too high, and they do not release them openly ｏｒ secretly.

Thirdly, with the increasingly strict environmental standards and the gradual improvement of public environmental awareness, some hazardous waste disposal units' construction standards are no longer suitable for current environmental requirements and have gradually withdrawn from the market. New disposal units have not yet been built, leaving gaps.

In recent years, environmental protection departments have strengthened the standardized management of hazardous waste, effectively blocking non compliant disposal pathways for enterprises. The Interpretation of the People's Courts and People's Procuratorates on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in Handling Criminal Cases of Environmental Pollution defines "illegal discharge, dumping, and disposal of hazardous waste of three tons ｏｒ more" as serious environmental pollution, which has deterred waste producing enterprises, enhanced their awareness of compliance, and further increased the demand for standardized disposal of hazardous waste.

Reducing and resourceful hazardous waste is the fundamental solution to the problem. But the urgent task is to quickly improve the disposal capacity of hazardous waste and thoroughly solve the problem of market imbalance. All regions should attach great importance to the disposal of hazardous waste, incorporate it into the local environmental infrastructure construction plan, and effectively increase human and material resources investment. We need to increase efforts to streamline administration and delegate power, delegate the approval authority for the operating license of hazardous waste comprehensive disposal projects to municipal environmental protection departments, increase the authority of grassroots environmental protection departments at all levels, and reduce administrative approval intervention. We should fully leverage the regulatory role of the market and the main role of enterprises, encourage enterprises to participate in the construction of centralized hazardous waste disposal projects in all aspects, encourage key enterprises to build their own disposal facilities, digest them on site, fully unleash market vitality, and make the majority of enterprises active investors and beneficiaries of hazardous waste management units. We must effectively strengthen in-process and post event supervision, supervise the construction and operation of hazardous waste disposal units, and urge enterprises to operate in compliance with the law.