Municipal Solid Waste treatment technologies the possibility to apply in developing contries, a case study in Vietnam

Abstract

On the basis of the characteristics of technologies, including mass balances, technical, environmental, social and economic criteria an assessment was made to analysis the appropriate municipal solid waste (MSW) treatment technologies for developing countries, including aerobic composting, anaerobic digestion, incineration and sanitary landfill. The strengths and weaknesses of each technology in the condition of developing countries and also the detail data relation to cost and benefit, technical, social and environmental impacts have indicated. The research showed that the choice of suitable technology much depends on the condition of density cities of developing countries, among that: high amount and typical characteristic of MSW, tropical weather, lack of budget and infrastructure, lack of efficiency technologies and skilled worker, weak of management control and support system; and land scare and high requirement of electricity. Landfill is now still the best choice to dump MSW in developing countries due to its advance in cost and convenient. However, biological treatments will increase their ratio due to land scare and the requirement of compost in agriculture countries, especially in case of MSW separation at sources as the plan of many developing countries. Anaerobic digestion is not yet applied in large scale in developing countries. Recently, the decision makers are considering on this technology due to the need of electricity and its advantage when the moisture of MSW is high. Incineration is the most expensive technology among others. It is even more expensive when MSW in developing countries is low heat value and high moisture content.