Application of GIS in Urban Solid Waste Management: A Case study in KCC

Urban solid waste management is considered as one of the most immediate and serious environmental problems confronting municipal authorities in developing countries like Bangladesh. A standard solid waste management should provide hygienic, efficient and economic collection, transportation and disposal of solid waste without polluting atmosphere. To ensure this standard management system GIS can be used as an effective tool in selecting suitable disposal sites and identifying the optimum routes for transportation. Suitable disposal sites and the optimum routes must have environmental safety criteria and attributes that will enable the wastes to be isolated so that there is no unacceptable risk to people or the environment while it is operating. The location of disposal sites of Khulna City Corporation represents the unconsciousness about the environmental and public health hazards. Response to this GIS here provides an opportunity to integrate spatial, aspatial data and other relevant data to select suitable disposal sites and identify optimum routes for transportation of solid waste. At this juncture GIS act as an important decision support system.This contribution first published in the poceedings of the National Seminar on Solid Waste Management – WasteSafe 2008 ; Khulna University of Engineering and Technology