Waste management - municipal solid waste management in emerging economies with the waste-management planning software WaPla

Abstract

As incomes rise, people consume more and produce more waste. The current rate of waste generation is estimated to be 2.01 billion tons per year, with a rising trend. It is expected to reach 3.4 billion tons by 2050 if the current rate of waste generation continues. This rising trend has an adverse effect on the environment and climate in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, which are estimated at 1.6 billion tons CO2eq in2016 from solid waste, which is around 5% of the total CO2eq emissions. This quantity is expected to rise to 2.6 billion tons CO2eq in 2050. Challenges in waste management are faced due to several factors, including the lack of standardized definition of municipal solid waste and lack of data collection of waste-related data.The objective of the Master Thesis is to get familiar with, and present, different types of waste, different types of waste disposal methods, challenges of, and to, appropriate waste management in emerging economies, and finally to make suggestions for appropriate waste management of MSW in emerging economies, based on literature review and mainly on the results of the analysis of waste data in the waste management planning software, WaPla, which has been developed by the Institute of Water Quality and Resource Management at the Technical University of Vienna. It provides an overview of waste flows in a city or a country and can identify the most affected waste disposal methods and the sources of highest emissions of unintended persistent organic pollutants and greenhouse gas.Using the WaPla software, the MT has presented 4 scenarios of waste-management planning based on the examples of the Chongwe District in Zambia and the Giza Governorate, the 6th of October City and the Sheikh Zayed City, in Egypt. The Master Thesis concludes that emerging economies should improve data collection of waste related data, as well as the coverage of waste collection and rather than increasing the usage of land as landfills/dumpsites, emerging economies should consider establishing waste-to-energy facilities to transform waste to resource.