Abstract
A waste reform was recently introduced in Russia to divert waste from landfills. To help advance the reform, this paper presents a life cycle assessment of the municipal solid waste management system in Russia’s second largest city—Saint Petersburg—and its neighboring Leningrad region. Five scenarios were evaluated: the current state of the system (S0), its expected post-reform state in 2024 (S1), and its state improved by increased landfill gas collection (S2), by increased waste incineration (S3), and by separate collection of waste (S4). The environmental impact was assessed in terms of climate change, acidification, eutrophication, and abiotic resource depletion (fossil fuels). The results showed an overall reduction in the environmental impact of the waste management system across all impact categories and all scenarios studied. The largest reduction in all impact categories (except abiotic resource depletion) was achieved through source separation of municipal solid waste. Particularly, global warming potential was reduced from 0.328 kg CO2-eq./kg waste generated in S0 to 0.010 kg CO2-eq./kg waste in S4. Regarding abiotic resource depletion potential (fossil fuels), the incineration scenario is the most beneficial, since it reduces the impact by 573%.
Highlights
As the global population grows and increases its consumption of resources, municipal solid waste (MSW) management poses a challenge worldwide
global warming potential (GWP) is reduced from 0.334 kg CO2-eq./kg MSW generated in Scenario 0 (S0) to −0.002 kg CO2-eq./kg MSW in S4.2
Due to the emissions avoided by the utilization of RDF, the Acidification Potential (AP) of the studied system in the baseline scenario, S0, is negative (−0.01 g SO2 eq./kg MSW)
Summary
As the global population grows and increases its consumption of resources, municipal solid waste (MSW) management poses a challenge worldwide. The main goal of MSW management is the disposal of waste under techno-economic constraints in order to avoid harmful effects to humans and the environment. Present-day challenges in MSW management are not limited to preserving public health and protecting the environment, and include efficient resource management and further reduction of environmental impact. The MSW management sector is associated with 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions [1]. It is a sink of secondary resources that can be recovered [2]. There is significant potential to improve MSW management towards achieving sustainability and circularity [1,3]
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