Book excerpt: Technologies are being developed by the US Department of Energy's (DOE) Nuclear Facility sites to convert low-level and mixed (hazardous and radioactive) wastes to a solid stabilized waste form for permanent disposal. One of the alternative technologies is vitrification into a borosilicate glass waste form. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has declared vitrification the Best Demonstrated Available Technology (BDAT) for high-level radioactive mixed waste and produced a Handbook of Vitrification Technologies for Treatment of Hazardous and Radioactive Waste. The DOE Office of Technology Development (OTD) has taken the position that mixed waste needs to be stabilized to the highest level reasonably possible to ensure that the resulting waste forms will meet both current and future regulatory specifications. Stabilization of low level and hazardous wastes in glass are in accord with the 1988 Savannah River Technology Center (SRTC), then the Savannah River Laboratory (SRL), Professional Planning Committee (PPC) recommendation that high nitrate containing (low-level) wastes be incorporated into a low temperature glass (via a sol-gel technology). The investigation into this new technology was considered timely because of the potential for large waste volume reduction compared to solidification into cement.