A case study evaluation of the impacts of optimised waste bin locations in a developing city

Abstract

This study was undertaken to evaluate the impacts of placing waste bins at optimal locations in the city of Ilorin, North Central Nigeria. The optimal locations of 1–10 waste bins were determined by the built-in solver for p-median problems in TransCAD v. 5.0 (Caliper, Corp.) software. The spatial performance of a particular number of waste bins created social, economic and environmental impacts which were evaluated from a combination of the attribute table from the p-median solution, solid waste generation data and collection operation data. The issues examined under these impacts were service coverage, public satisfaction, waste bin utility, costs associated with service provision and emissions from collection vehicles. The results indicate that service coverage and public satisfaction improved as the number of waste bins was increased from one to five. With 6–10 waste bins, 100% service coverage and public satisfaction was attained, however, some waste bins became underutilised. The service provision costs and emissions from the collection vehicle also increased as the number of waste bins increased. A multi-criteria analysis of these impacts can assist municipal authorities in achieving sustainable solid waste management.

Keywords:

• solid waste
• optimised location
• waste bin
• developing country
• impact

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the support of Dr. Joni Downs of the Department of Geography, University of South Florida, USA, who made the TransCAD software available for solving the p-median problem. We also appreciate the remarkable input of Prof. James Mihelcic of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of South Florida, USA. The authors also thank the U.S. Department; sponsor of the Fulbright Junior Staff Development program for their financial support to the lead author. Helpful comments and suggestions by anonymous referees and the Associate Editor are appreciated.