Title: Municipal solid waste management index in urban areas: Delphi validated tool

Authors: Shefali Godura; Arun Kumar Aggarwal; Prakash Bhatia

Addresses: Department of Community Medicine, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh, 160012, India ' Department of Community Medicine, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh, 160012, India ' Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Osmania Medical College (OMC), Koti, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India

Abstract: Due to non-availability of a comprehensive index to assess and score status of municipal solid waste management (MSWM) of a given place, a Delphi validated index was developed. Multistage-sampling technique was used at the household, street, bin, transportation, processing and disposal level observations in two Indian cities namely, Chandigarh and Hyderabad. Final index included total 52 observable items. Mean household waste management score was 4.25 (95% C.I., 4.09-4.41) in Chandigarh as compared to 4.09 (95% C.I., 3.95-4.23) at Hyderabad. Street level median score was 1.0 (0.0-3.0) for Chandigarh and 0.5 (0.0-5.0) for Hyderabad. Mean bin level score was 5.27 (95% C.I., 3.93-6.63) for Chandigarh and 4.58 (95% C.I., 3.62-5.54) for Hyderabad. The researcher achieved the objective of first time developing and using a scientific index to quantify the status of MSWM comprehensively of a city and compared it with another city.

Keywords: municipal solid waste management index; MSWM; Delphi process; collection; transportation; processing; disposal.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEWM.2017.087150

International Journal of Environment and Waste Management, 2017 Vol.20 No.3, pp.215 - 232

Accepted: 16 Mar 2017
Published online: 06 Oct 2017 *

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