Municipal Solid Waste Disposal Research Articles

Restructuring municipal solid waste management and governance in Hong Kong: Options and prospects.

From the chronological analytical review regarding municipal solid waste management (MSWM) and governance optimisation progress in Hong Kong since 2002, it is noted that the policy outcomes have seriously deviated from the original policy goals under the hitherto lack of effective development in bureaucratic and economic policy cultures in municipal solid waste (MSW) strategies formulation and related programmes implementation. The policy analysis specially stated that although the MSW recycling ratio (30%) is not particularly poor, the recovered percentage of plastics, glass and food waste in Hong Kong are extremely low. Based on the unfavourable outcomes and consequences for MSWM and governance in Hong Kong, a conclusion of negative correlation between the per capita MSW disposal rate and bureaucratic policy culture development, as well as positive correlation between recycling rate of low value items and economic policy culture development, can be made. With considering the key factors of benchmark indicators, socio-economic factors, driving force, and communication of MSW policy, conducive options and prospects are also developed for the attempt to provide insights to restructure MSWM and governance in Hong Kong in the next decade. First, the government can build up strategic innovation from a global benchmark case - MSWM and governance improvement from the South Korea case. Second, to create opportunities and conditions to develop high value biofuel from waste through flexible local environmental policies formulation and implementation. Third, shifting a front-line MSWM for governance structure reform.

Application of electrical resistivity tomography and hydro-chemical analysis for an integrated environmental assessment

Municipal solid waste disposal sites generate groundwater contamination through leachate release to the surrounding environment, causing various harmful and deleterious effects. Thus, an integrated assessment of landfilling impact on the environment via the combination of electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) and hydro-chemical analysis from existing wells was undertaken to ascertain the contamination of both surface and groundwater near the Bizerte landfill site, northeastern Tunisia. The ERT measurement indicated a polluted depth of over 20 m beneath the surface which coincides with marly substratum.Similarly, hydro-chemical analysis showed that continuous leachate generation obviously affected chemical properties of surface and groundwater, especially an increase in heavy metals contents (lead, cadmium and nickel contents). The results also indicated significant microbiological contaminations of the water samples. Nemerow pollution index (WQI) for water classification indicated that all sites had clean water with respect to metal contamination, except for R1 and R2 (surface water), which have WQI values of 2.5 and 2.1, respectively. Based on those results, it is recommended to strictly monitor leachate generation, surface water and groundwater quality in the Bizerte landfill for an integrated sustainable environmental assessment.

INVESTIGATION OF MORPHOLOGICAL COMPOSITION AND EVALUATION OF THE EFFECTIVENESS OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE RECYCLING METHODS IN UZBEKISTAN

This article deals with the problem of Municipal solid waste (MSW) in the Republic of Uzbekistan. In the process of research, the methods for the disposal of MSW that are still used in the country, such as incineration and disposal at landfills, were examined. For the necessity to implement innovations in the work of handling MSW, the basic morphological composition of MSW in the winter, spring, summer and autumn seasonal periods was researched. Based on the results obtained, an innovative direction is proposed for the processing of MSW into secondary raw materials in order to solve the problems of resource savings and jointly with the solution of environmental and economic problems of the republic. To solve the problem of waste management, an innovative technology has been proposed for the transition from landfills to waste recycling plants.

ENGINEERING GEOLOGICAL TYPIFICATION OF TERRITORIES FOR ALLOCATION OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT FACILITIES

The management of municipal solid waste (MSW) appears to be one of the major ecological problems at present. Selecting sites for the disposal of municipal solid wastes or waste utilization facilities is one of the most contentious aspects of waste management. The present study aimed to develop the methodology to assess the natural protection of the geological environment from contamination upon the implementation of large ecological projects due to the allocation of MSW utilization facilities. The case of the Central Federal District of Russia (CFD) is taken as an example. The suitability of territories for municipal solid waste disposal is assessed according to the presence of weakly permeable deposits in the geological cross-section and their occurrence mode. A “map of engineering geological zoning CFD by the conditions of allocation MSW disposal sites and utilization facilities” has been compiled to a scale 1:2500000. The map gives a general indication of the suitability of the planned sites for waste disposal within the regarded region and showed that, for the bulk of territory, the allocation of MSW disposal and management facilities requires undertaking additional measures for the geoenvironmental protection from contamination.

Multidimensionality and Methods for Solving the Problem of Municipal Solid Waste Utilization

The problems of utilization of solid municipal waste are considered, specific methods for its solution are proposed. It was established that one of the main directions of the disposal of solid municipal waste should be considered as their burning. The heat balance of the combustion of wood waste, rubber waste, polymer waste (plastics, tires), agricultural waste. Some specific parameters are determined, such as specific heat of combustion, temperature of complete combustion. It is shown that solid municipal waste should be incinerated using plants for their autothermal processing. The use of the OS 125-1000 series of heating systems as a mobile unit for burning the heating system is justified. The impact of the proposed technology for the disposal of municipal solid waste on the environment is assessed.

Temporal behavior analysis of leachate contamination in a tropical landfill.

Leachate generation is one of the problems present in the landfills and dumps, needing monitoring and quantification for the environmental conservation. The objective of this paper is to evaluate temporal data of leachate contamination in a municipal solid waste (MSW) landfill, located in the midwest of São Paulo state, Brazil. The physical-chemical parameters and chemical compounds of the local groundwater were evaluated during 13years (2002 to 2015). The methodology included data processing and temporal behavior analysis by Mann-Kendall test. Physical-chemical parameters demonstrated a change from acid to basic medium and decrease of BOD, COD, and TOC concentrations. Chemical compounds demonstrated high concentrations close to the administration building of the landfill, despite the decrease of certain compounds (Al, Fe, Hg, K, Na, Pb, SO42-, total PO43-, Zn) over time in the entire landfill area. The results demonstrate that the landfill is in natural attenuation process, and the structures of the surrounding landscape and the location of the MSW disposal are fundamental to understand the presence and rate of each chemical compound.

Repercussions of COVID-19 pandemic on municipal solid waste management: Challenges and opportunities

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused global emergency and has raised social and economic concerns which will also spill over to environmental issues. Amid this natural experiment, current study evaluates prevailing municipal solid waste (MSW) management practices, with the emphasis on MSW treatment and disposal facilities in select developed and developing countries. The data and information used in this paper is collected from several scientific research papers from different disciplines, publications from governments and multilateral agencies and media reports. Despite limited literature on MSW management during such pandemics, this article presets a global backdrop of MSW management during COVID-19 outbreak and examines various aspects of MSW management. Discussion includes identifying parameters of disease transmission through solid waste handling, consequences of medical waste surge on current municipal waste treatment and disposal systems. Further, based on previous pandemic and disaster waste management studies, this study also presents challenges and opportunities in the aftermath of the ongoing pandemic. The paper recommends alternatives approaches for MSW treatment and disposal and outlines the future scope of work to achieve sustainable waste management during and aftermath of the pandemics.

Mapping the Structure of Food Waste Management Research: A Co-Keyword Analysis.

Food loss and waste represent a global problem in the ethical, social, environmental, and economic contexts. The aim of this article is to identify leading concepts in studies on food loss and waste in management research by network analysis of the co-occurrence of keywords, via mapping of knowledge domains, a method used in bibliometrics. We analyzed 2202 records from the Scopus database on food waste management with the aid of the VOSviewer software tool. In particular, keyword co-occurrence analysis was adopted to visually explore knowledge bases, topic distribution, and research fronts in the field of food waste management research. Ten representative areas were found concentrated in main keywords, namely, food waste, waste management, food, anaerobic digestion, waste disposal, recycling, waste treatment, municipal solid waste, solid waste, and refuse disposal.

Investigation of Anaerobic Digestion of Organic Solid Waste

The technology of anaerobic digestion of organic solid wastes is, in many aspects, mature. Topics such as fundamentals (kinetics, modeling, etc...) Process aspects performance, two and single phase systems, wet technologies, digestion enhancement of several treatments. Digestion with other substrates and its relation to composting technology are examined in this review. Special attention is paid to the advantages of anaerobic digestion in limiting the emission of greenhouse gases. An overview of industrial achievements and future developments. Municipal solid waste management (MSWM) is one of the major environmental problems of Indian cities. Improper management of municipal solid waste (MSW) causes hazards to inhabitants. Various studies reveal that about 90% of MSW is disposed of unscientifically in open dumps and landfills, creating problems to public health and the environment. In the present study, an attempt has been made to provide a comprehensive review of the characteristics, generation, collection and transportation, disposal and treatment technologies of MSW practiced in India Special attention is paid to the advantages of anaerobic digestion in limiting the emission of greenhouse gases. On overview domestic and organic waste achievement and future development.

Analysis of Tokyo’s municipal solid waste management system

The article analyzes the features of municipal solid waste management in Tokyo. Special attention is paid to the analysis of trends in the volume of waste in the city of Tokyo over the past decades, as well as the reasons for the constant decline in these volumes. The article deals with the waste management activities of the Clean Authority of Tokyo, discusses the features of treatment of various types of waste, as well as the arrangement of the Tokyo city waste landfill. It was noted that the capital of Japan succeeded in creating an effective system for the disposal and recycling of municipal solid waste that can ensure the environmental safety of the city, as well as integrate waste into the country’s fuel and energy complex. An important feature of Japanese waste management companies is the desire not only to comply with official environmental standards, but also to adhere to their own standards, even more stringent. Based on an analysis of Japanese experience, the authors put forward proposals for optimizing the sphere of waste management in Russia. In particular, attention is drawn to the need to prevent an environmental catastrophe caused by a careless attitude to waste, improve the quality of life of citizens, prevent social unrest associated with environmental pollution, and also involve waste in the generation of electricity and heat. The authors note that as part of the “trash” reform, it is necessary to increase the environmental awareness of citizens, provide citizens with relevant and complete information about the industry, and create stricter environmental standards for waste to energy plants and other enterprises involved in waste management.

Sustainable strategy for municipal solid waste disposal in Hong Kong: current practices and future perspectives.

Hong Kong (HK) is confronted by increasing problems of solid waste disposal, as it is an overpopulated city with limited land resources. Currently, solid waste disposal mainly relies on three landfills located in the New Territories. However, the current waste treatment facilities and policies cannot appropriately control and manage increments of solid waste. The primary reason is the increased amount of municipal solid waste (MSW) caused by the growth of the population and the economy, with food waste accounting for the largest proportion of MSW in HK. The secondary reason is that the capacity of existing landfills will be exhausted in the near future as the level of waste generated continues to grow. To deal with these problems, in this paper, we propose five approaches with the aim of identifying the most sustainable strategy for efficient solid waste disposal in HK: a food waste recycling program; an MSW charging scheme; the implementation of incineration plants (i.e., waste to energy); black soldier fly bioconversion and a waste trading scheme; and black soldier fly bioconversion and a hybrid anaerobic digestion system. This is followed by a detailed demonstration of each approach, particularly focusing on the benefits, limitations, and implementation of each in the case of HK. The results of this study may shed light on how to effectively and sustainably manage the increasing amount of solid waste in HK.

The feasibility analysis of cement kiln as an MSW treatment infrastructure: From a life cycle environmental impact perspective

Subsequent to the sharp surge in quantity of municipal solid waste (MSW) generation, the pace at which waste treatment facilities are being constructed in some cities cannot meet the increasing demand for MSW treatment capacity. As a remedy to this, the co-processing of MSW in high-temperature cement kilns has become a potential MSW treatment option in emerging countries, and has been widely implemented in developed countries such as Netherlands and Germany. However, the environmental impacts of MSW co-processing in cement kilns differ from those of traditional treatment technologies. Besides, it is necessary to determine whether MSW co-processing in cement kilns could reduce the overall environmental impacts of MSW treatment and disposal as a whole, which is a key step in analyzing the feasibility of the treatment technology. Hence, this study used the life cycle assessment (LCA) method to quantitatively analyze the environmental impacts of MSW co-processing in cement kilns and the results further compared with other MSW treatment technologies. The functional unit was one ton of raw MSW, and real operational data from the cement industry and MSW treatment project in China was used for case studies. The results revealed that when compared to incineration and mechanical biological treatment (MBT), the environmental impact mitigation of energy recovery during MSW co-processing in cement kilns is not that significant. However, since there is no required additional treatment of residual waste and wastewater, the environmental impact caused by MSW co-processing in cement kiln appeared to be much lower from a life cycle perspective. Therefore, under conditions of insufficient MSW treatment capacity, co-processing in cement kiln could be an effective complementary approach to MSW management in China and other emerging countries which have many new dry cement kilns suitable for this alternative complementary technique of MSW treatment and disposal.

Territorial Placement of Solid Municipal Waste Landfills

This paper discusses the scientific foundations of spatial planning for the disposal of municipal solid waste (MSW), which has been intensively accumulated in Russia. It is noted that the chaotic, uncontrolled disposal of waste leads to contamination of atmospheric air, soil, rocks, and groundwater, the most important life-supporting resources of the biosphere, which causes a decrease in the quality of life of people. A scientifically substantiated solution to this problem is based on geotechnical zoning of territories according to geological conditions, which allows finding “geological traps” that can guarantee isolation of waste from the environment. Taking into account the methodology of such zoning, examples of its application for disposing of waste in geological massifs of various degrees of suitability are provided.

Heavy metals decreased by water elution method on bottom ash from municipal solid waste incineration plant

By incineration treatment became the most important g municipal solid waste disposal method. The bottom ash, which accounting for 20% to 30% of the original municipal solid waste has been a large content source of municipal solid waste in China. The heavy metal will be released to the environment by the eluent produced from the bottom ash. It has a negative influence on bottom ash treatment and reuse. This study analyzed the changing of heavy metals of Cu, Ni and Zn during the elution process by the column simulation experiment. The study revealed the regulation of heavy metals migration under the condition of slow speed elution. These results can help environmental release risk assessment of heavy metal in bottom ash from municipal solid waste incineration plant.

Methane potential and degradation kinetics of fresh and excavated municipal solid waste from a tropical landfill in Colombia

The optimization of degradation processes and the management of leachate and biogas produced in landfills are key aspects for the establishment of more sustainable municipal solid waste (MSW) disposal in developing countries. In this study, biochemical methane potential (BMP) tests were used to evaluate CH4 production potential and degradation kinetics of fresh waste (FW) and five-year aged excavated waste (EW) samples from a tropical controlled landfill with compositional characteristics of developing countries. BMP tests with reconstituted samples of the biodegradable fraction of both MSW types were performed at three substrate/inoculum (S/I) ratios (0.3, 0.5 and 1.0 g VS substrate g− 1 VS inoculum), and CH4 generation parameters were determined using the first-order and modified Gompertz kinetic models. After 30-d, the best BMP results were reached at S/I ratios of 0.5 and 1.0, with cumulative CH4 productions of 528 and 433 mL CH4 g− 1 VS for FW, respectively; and 151 and 135 mL CH4 g− 1 VS for EW, respectively. The first-order kinetic model provided a good fit to BMP results for FW, whereas the modified Gompertz model showed a better adjustment to the BMP data for EW. Calculated first-order CH4 generation rates for FW and EW were in the range 0.19–0.36 and 0.23–0.25 d− 1, respectively. These results evidence the high biodegradability and CH4 potential of FW disposed of in a tropical landfill in Colombia and the reduced BMP of EW despite a relatively short period after disposal under conventional landfill operation conditions.

Economic Analysis of “Garbage Conflicts” (The Example of Modern Russia)

The article is devoted to the economic analysis of conflicts related to the disposal of municipal solid waste. A wave of protests, both against garbage dumps and against the construction of incineration plants, overwhelmed Moscow suburbs in the summer of 2017. These protests are a form of environmental conflict and are well described by the theory of external effects. This theory allows us to identify and evaluate the real economic costs of various waste disposal options which the decision makers do not take into account. The article analyzes quantitative estimates of the external effects of the most common waste management methods – landfilling and incineration. It is shown that the distribution of external costs between the source of externalities and recipients forms an objective economic basis of “garbage conflicts”. These are important social markers of unsustainability. The concept of sustainable development requires a transition to a higher level in the hierarchy of waste management methods – the processing and reuse of waste, for which incineration is a competitor. Western countries imposed a moratorium on the construction of new incineration plants and strengthened modernization requirements to the remaining plants. Despite this fact the Russian government proposes a strategy based on outdated technologies of incineration. The environmental characteristics of these new plants are inferior to the Western ones. In this regard, we can expect only an increase in the protest activity of the population, which can be stopped only by developing a really science-based concept of solid waste management.

New insights into regional differences of the predictions of municipal solid waste generation rates using artificial neural networks

As one of the most popular non-linear models, artificial neural network (ANN) has been successfully applied in the prediction of municipal solid waste (MSW). Despite its high accuracy achieved in a specific city or region, little progress is made on a larger-scale, which would be resulted from the regional difference. In this study, ANN models for MSW prediction in mainland China are developed and optimized. Besides a model aiming for all cities, regional models are developed by grouping these cities into three categories. Impact of regional difference in MSW prediction is analyzed by evaluation of model’s dependence on each predictor, and comparisons made between these models. Results show that regional difference has huge impact on MSW prediction. Accuracy of MSW prediction would increase from 0.916 in R2 and 59.3 in rooted mean squared error (RMSE) to 0.968/0.946/0.943 in R2 and 6.4/9.7/17.6 in RMSE for southern/northern/western region after a three-region division. Models for MSW prediction in southern and northern region of mainland China share much similarity in dependence on predictors, which differs a lot from that for western region. Further cross-prediction process confirmed that models for southern or northern regions might be suitable for the MSW prediction in another, yet not apply to that in western region. Such large-scale based model can be used by cities lacking historical data for prediction of their local MSW generation, the predictive result would be helpful in MSW disposal planning and the analysis of regional difference would be helpful in establishing regional policy, especially for the three regions in mainland China.

Identification of leachate infiltration and its flow pathway in landfill by means of electrical resistivity tomography (ERT).

Sanitary landfills are a well-planned engineering work for final disposal of municipal solid waste in order to minimize the environmental impacts in soil and groundwater. Therefore, several control systems are installed such as liners and leachate and biogas collectors. However, the establishment of landfill in vulnerable areas, the inadequate operations, and failures in collectors and liner systems can cause subsurface contamination. The discovery of eventual leachate leakage usually is based on chemical analyses of groundwater using monitoring wells; which may not be representative in spatial terms. This work involves a geophysical monitoring of the leachate percolation in a landfill waste cell closed in 2014, in which geomembrane boreholes and aquifer contamination have been proved. The DC resistivity method was applied by means of electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) in order to detect eventual contrasts in electrical properties. Twelve ERT lines have been carried out in a steady mesh during three years of study (2016, 2017, and 2018). The results of 2016 allowed a clear contrast between zones of leachate percolation into the aquifer and the natural environment. The comparative analyses of the three-year monitoring results reveal a gradual increase in resistivity values in the areas of leachate percolation. The absence of replacement of biodegradable organic matter after 2014 conditions the gradual decrease of leachate salinity. In this sense, the increase in resistivity is an indicator of the tendency for chemical stabilization of the organic waste and existence of natural attenuation processes.

Exergoeconomic analysis of a Mechanical Biological Treatment plant in an Integrated Solid Waste Management system including uncertainties

Municipal Solid Waste disposal is still a crucial issue, which is influenced by heterogeneous factors (political, social, economic and technological). The Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT) plant is an important element of an Integrated Solid Waste Management system. These plants are aimed at separating the light and dry fraction of the Unsorted Waste from the wet one, producing the Refused Derived Fuel and recovering the metal parts. In the present work, an Exergoeconomic analysis is performed on two MBT plant structures in order to assess the unit exergy-based cost of products and allocate the irreversibility associated to each equipment. A linear variation of degree of Selective Collection (SC) of single materials (±30% respect to the base case) shows that the major influence on production costs is associated to the SC of plastic. A Monte Carlo simulation is then carried out by sampling from distributions of external (waste composition) and internal (energy consumption) uncertain variables. The resulted mean values (μ) and standard deviations (RStD) can be useful at the time of designing a new plant. The influence of the internal variable is definitely lower than the external one, with values of RStD more than 90% lower.

Key informants’ perspectives on the challenges of municipal solid waste management in Iran: a mixed method study

Evaluation of the municipal solid waste (MSW) management system seems necessary to promote urban services. The present study is aimed to identify and prioritize the problems and deficiencies of MSW management in Iran. This study has used a mixed-methods (Scoping review and Delphi technique) approach to achieve its goals. The results obtained by the scoping review showed that the average rate of Iran’s MSW generation in the last decade (2009–2019) was 0.745 kg/capita/day. The average of MSW composition was estimated to include: organic material (68.42%), paper and cardboard (7.31%), plastic (9.80%), pet (0.99%), metal (1.59%), rubber (1.09%), textile (3.02%), glass (2.33%), wood (0.97%), and others (4.48%). Also a scoping review of the current status of Iran’s MSW management showed that at present, Iran’s MSW management has both some strengths (such as collecting more than 90% of the total generated MSW) and lot of weaknesses such as lack of a systematic program for MSW reduction, weakness in source separation, low processing and recycling, unsanitary disposal of MSW, etc. According to the results of the Delphi technique, Iran’s main MSW management problems are: disregarding the investment for culturalization in the field of SWM and low effectiveness of the existing educational methods, disregarding the principles of integrated solid waste management hierarchy, imbalance in cost-efficiency in MSW systems, the existence of major deficits and weaknesses in recruitment and selection of staffs and the existence of additional non-expert human resources, lack of incongruity between the non-standard solid waste disposal crimes and their penalties, lack of executive guarantees for the proper implementation of the existing regulations, poor performance of the responsible organizations in the field of public education, as well as lack of effective cooperation among the responsible bodies in this field. Overall, consideration and elimination of priority problems and reinforcement the strengths of Iran’s MSW management system can be effective in improving the performance of this system.