Spatial Assessment of Risky and Safe Sites for Solid Waste Landfills (Case study: Isfahan province)

Authors

1 Department of Civil Engineering, University of Isfahan

2 Department of Geomatics Engineering, University of Isfahan

Abstract

The site selection of facilities, stations, and landfills for municipal solid waste management requires an integrated environmental assessment. For this purpose, spatial assessment based on geographical data and layers is inevitable to determine the minimum required distance from essential or vulnerable locations to preserve the environment. In this study, 70 layers of Isfahan province, centre Iran, were gathered, prepared, overlapped in ArcGIS software including their buffering zones (between 200 meters and 8 kilometers). The superposition of these layers and buffering zones revealed that 43% of the province area has the potential of implementing landfills or solid waste management facilities. In addition, among the 210 existing landfills and facilities in Isfahan province, simply 16% are already located in safe areas. 37% of landfills and waste management facilities are currently inappropriately located (IL) because of having 3 or more spatial environmental violations. This number reduces to 9.5% for the sites with at least 5 spatial violations. This result could highlight solid waste management sites with severely inappropriate locations (SIL). Most of these sites are landfills where their relocation should be prioritized. In addition, this research recommended that site selection should be carried out based on a classification system in three categories of risky, conditional and safe areas. Areas classified as conditional should consider elaborate engineering methods prior any waste management practices

Keywords

Main Subjects

Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 18 April 2023

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics