Environmental Hotspots Evaluation of Municipal Solid Waste Treatment Facilities in Human Health and Climate Change

Abstract

Due to waste heterogeneity, different treatment facilities are needed to treat various types of waste. The major sub-processes in a waste treatment facility that incur high environmental burdens and offset as value-added resources have yet to be feasibly realized at a large scale. This study aims to identify the environmental hotspots of four commonly-used solid waste treatment facilities (open landfill, sanitary landfill, tunnel composting, mechanical material recovery facility) with a focus on human health (fine particulate matter formation, human carcinogenic toxicity, and human non-carcinogenic toxicity) and climate change impacts through life cycle assessment. The major environmental hotspots for open landfills and sanitary landfills are the landfill gas emission in global warming (601.8 kg CO₂-eq/t MSW and 353.9 kg CO₂-eq/t MSW); tunnel composting is the electricity consumption (57 - 84 % of total performance); while mechanical material recovery facility is the recovered material (99.6 - 99.8 % of total performance). Recommendations are proposed to reduce the major environmental burdens of the waste treatment facilities. This study provides practical scenarios to policymakers in formulating a sustainable municipal solid waste management framework with reduced impacts on human health and climate change.