Site selection and environmental risks assessment of medical solid waste landfill for the City of Kermanshah-Iran

ABSTRACT

In this study, an integration of multi-criteria evaluation, geographic information system, and remote sensing techniques were used for site selection of medical waste landfills in Kermanshah, Iran. Also, an environmental risk assessment for the selected site has been conducted in order to minimize the possible hazardous. The GIS and remote sensing were used for acquiring and preparing layers and maps and the multi-criteria evaluation was used for setting aim, criteria selection, criteria weighting, and final decision making. The results showed that only 1.2% of the study area is scored high-suitable, while 90% of the area is considered unsuitable that makes this region critical for preservation. After further assessment and field visits, a suitable site was selected for landfilling. Environmental risk assessment showed that the selected site poses a low-level of risks to the environment and surrounding areas and this is because various environmental and health aspects have been considered in the site selection process.

KEYWORDS:

• Landfill
• medical waste
• geographical information system
• remote sensing
• multi-criteria evaluation

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences for their financial support. We also would like to express our thanks to the organizations for providing data and information.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences.