This document represents a public white paper report of three long term facilities studied in 2005. Permission to use the facilities by name was originally obtained though not exercised by the authors. The project began as an independent and self funded study while the lead author was attending the University of Ottawa as an undergraduate student. This project investigated both public and private facilities. Results were compiled in 2009 and presented as a paper at the IASTED International Conference on Environmental Management and Engineering. This paper can be referenced as such. This white paper also includes an additional appendix for calculations made, some grammatical/spelling corrections, new formatting, updated images and the original presentation slides used to relay information at the aforementioned conference. For further details or for the full background documents please send the corresponding author an email.

Long-term care (LTC) facilities are growing in number in the province of Ontario. Typically, Canadian LTC facilities house an average of over 100 residents. Environmental concerns associated to waste management in LTC facilities have not been fully explored, and relevant information is apparently limited in the available research literature. An independent study was conducted to investigate solid waste management in LTC facilities in Ontario. Both privately and municipally-owned LTC facilities were considered. The paper draws its observations from site visits, as well as interviews with facilitators and management of environmental services of LTC facilities. The study explores two main areas of waste management in LTC facilities; characterization of solid waste, and waste disposal criteria.