Municipal Solid Waste

Integrated Logistical, Techno-economic and Socio-environmental Assessment Framework for Sustained Municipal Solid Waste Conversion Facilities

Mahdi Vaezi, Ph.D.
NIU Assistant Professor of Engineering Technology 

In 2020, Assistant Professor Mahdi Vaezi, along with Krishna Reddy, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), received an Illinois Innovation Network seed grant to create an integrated framework for municipal solid waste facilities for the state of Illinois.

Municipal solid waste (MSW), also called garbage or trash, is nonhazardous disposable materials generated by households, institutions, industries, agriculture, and sewage which is typically recycled or disposed of in landfills. Vaezi and Reddy’s framework aims to shift the paradigm of MSW for the state of Illinois, allowing more trash to be converted into value-added products and eventually leading to a zero-landfill state.

Reddy’s research background is in landfill management, and Vaezi’s is in techno-economic analysis – which considers technical and economic factors simultaneously in order to comprehensively analyze a waste processing facility and determine return on investment.

During 2021, the team will engage in a multi-step analysis of Illinois data, using geospatial analysis (GIS tools) to determine optimal locations and recommended types of waste processing facilities for the state. The first step is to comprehensively analyze how much and what types of waste (plastic, glass, organic materials, etc.) are produced by each of the 102 counties in Illinois. The team will also analyze the landfills and recycling facilities currently operating in Illinois, as well as the receiving stations that collect waste from surrounding areas before it is transported in bulk to landfills. Finally, the team will use this data to simulate a zero-landfill state, analyzing which locations and waste conversion processes will create the greatest return on investment. The waste conversion technologies available include gasification, composting, and anaerobic digestion – all of which can turn trash into value-added products such as synthetic gas and electricity.

By decreasing payments to place materials in landfills and increasing profits from value-added products, this MSW framework has the potential to create both economic and environmental benefits for the state. The data will be presented to state, city and county decision makers to help them make choices for a more sustainable Illinois – both economically and environmentally.