Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369

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Waste Management
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/wasman

Life cycle assessment of four municipal solid waste management scenarios in China
Jinglan Hong a,*, Xiangzhi Li b, Cui Zhaojie a
a
School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Shandong University, Jinan 250100, PR China
b
Department of Pathology, University of Michigan, 1301 Catherine, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A life cycle assessment was carried out to estimate the environmental impact of municipal solid waste.
Received 16 October 2009 Four scenarios mostly used in China were compared to assess the influence of various technologies on
Accepted 29 March 2010 environment: (1) landfill, (2) incineration, (3) composting plus landfill, and (4) composting plus inciner-
Available online 27 April 2010
ation. In all scenarios, the technologies significantly contribute to global warming and increase the
adverse impact of non-carcinogens on the environment. The technologies played only a small role in
the impact of carcinogens, respiratory inorganics, terrestrial ecotoxicity, and non-renewable energy. Sim-
ilarly, the influence of the technologies on the way other elements affect the environment was ignorable.
Specifically, the direct emissions from the operation processes involved played an important role in most
scenarios except for incineration, while potential impact generated from transport, infrastructure and
energy consumption were quite small. In addition, in the global warming category, highest potential
impact was observed in landfill because of the direct methane gas emissions. Electricity recovery from
methane gas was the key factor for reducing the potential impact of global warming. Therefore, increas-
ing the use of methane gas to recover electricity is highly recommended to reduce the adverse impact of
landfills on the environment.
Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction remnant organic materials. Composted MSW can be used as a soil

Municipal solid waste (MSW) refers to waste generated from
householders. Due to vast population growth and urbanization,
the volume of MSW produced in China has dramatically increased.
For instance, about 1.1  108 and 1.6  108 ton of the MSW pro-
duced in China had been reported in 1995 and 2004, respectively
(Ministry of Construction of China, 2005), corresponding to an in-
crease of 45% in just a span of 10 years. By the end of 2004, a total
of 661 cities had 559 MSW disposal systems in China (Ministry of
Construction of China, 2005). MSW treatment is mainly carried out
using three processes corresponding to three different treatment
technologies: landfill (86.5%), composting (6.4%) and incineration
(7.1%) (Ministry of Construction of China, 2005). However, in
2005, only 35% of landfill sites are considered safe (Fang, 2007).
The rest of landfill sites are simply filled in order to dispose waste.
In response, the China government has recently turned its atten-
tion to the construction of MSW treatment plants in order to ad-
dress the growing problem on MSW.
Due to the undesirable effects of landfill gas and landfill leach-
ate (Ilgen et al., 2008), composting has recently become one of the
alternatives to the use of landfills due to its feature of waste recy-
clability. Composting refers to the process of decomposition of
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 (531) 88362328; fax: +86 (531) 88364513.
E-mail address: hongjing@sdu.edu.cn (J. Hong).
conditioner in agriculture and horticulture, and it returns carbon,
nitrogen, phosphorus and other essential elements back to the soil.
However, heavy metals can limit the reuse of composted sludge for
agricultural purposes (Wang et al., 2008). As another MSW treat-
ment method, incineration has also received increased attention
due to its properties of energy recovery and waste volume reduc-
tion. However, the pollutant output of incineration is atmosphere
emission of flue gas which consists of significant amounts of diox-
in, furan, and fly ash. Fly ash contains toxic metals such as lead,
cadmium, copper, and zinc, as well as amounts of dioxin and furan
(Sakamoto et al., 2001). The US Environmental Protection Agency
(2007) has classified these toxic metals and dioxins as possible
cancer-causing substances. Although several processes such as
the use of fabric filters, the activated carbon powder injection sys-
tem, and scrubbers are used in the incineration process to remove
dioxin and heavy metals, the complete elimination of these sub-
stances is difficult. In recent years, the advantages of the above-
mentioned treatment methods vis-à-vis their shortcomings have
been strongly debated on. Therefore, methods that evaluate their
environmental acceptability consistently are urgently needed.
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is an effective tool to evaluate the
environmental burdens associated with a product, process, or
activity by identifying, quantifying and assessing the impact of
the utilized energy, materials and the wastes released to the envi-
ronment (Curran, 2004). Today, the LCA applications are used as

0956-053X/$ - see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.wasman.2010.03.038
 J. Hong et al. / Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369 2363

the basis of eco-labeling program, strategic planning, marketing,
consumer education, process improvement and product design
throughout the world.
The environmental impact of MSW has been extensively stud-
ied using LCA method (Björklund and Finnveden, 2005; Rodri-
guez-Iglesias et al., 2003; Emery et al., 2007; Banar et al., 2009;
Den Boer et al., 2007; Bjarnadóttir et al., 2002). A recent review
shows that most of the LCAs are unclear regarding whether or
not life cycle emissions from energy inputs or capital equipment
are included in the calculation of results (Cleary, 2009). Although
there have been extensive LCA case studies on MSW in China
(Hong et al., 2006; Wei et al., 2009; Li et al., 2009; Liu et al.,
2008), only two have been published in English-language peer-re-
viewed journals (Hong et al., 2006; Zhao et al., 2009). Including the
study by Cleary (2009), all of LCA case studies on MSW treatment
in China have only considered the environmental impact of its
operation, and have not quantitatively present the environmental
impact of building and equipment. Li et al. (2009) and Liu et al.
(2008) did not conduct an environmental analysis of electricity
recovery from waste incineration generated from incineration pro-
cess. Hong et al. (2006) and Li et al. (2009) did not conduct envi-
ronmental analyses of electricity recovery from methane gas
from landfill. Zhao et al. (2009) discussed only the environmental
potential impact of global warming category. Moreover, there has
been a noticeable lack of significant information on the heavy me-
tal emissions generated from incineration and composting (Hong
et al., 2006; Liu et al., 2008; Wei et al., 2009). Accordingly, research
needs to address certain issues to provide a more reliable assess-
ment. The following should be done: (a) describe the environmen-
tal impact of building and equipment; (b) the life cycle inventory
should cover heavy metal emissions from incineration and com-
posting; (c) electricity recovery from incineration and landfill
should be taken into account; and (d) the environmental perfor-
mances of the MSW treatment in China need to be characterized
and compared with those in other parts of the world. In this study,
LCA was conducted to prevent and control MSW pollution, identify
the best system for MSW treatment, address the above-mentioned
needs, and estimate the environmental impact of the scenarios that
are commonly used in China, namely, landfill, incineration,
composting plus incineration, and composting plus landfill. This
research quantified the environmental impact of equipment, build-
ing, energy, operation, and transport of involved in the above-men-
tioned alternatives.
2. Scope definition
2.1. Functional unit
The functional unit is the comparison unit in a life cycle inven-
tory. In this study, management of 1 ton dry MSW is chosen. All
emissions, energy consumption, and materials are based to this
functional unit.
2.2. System boundaries
Fig. 1 presents system boundaries for each scenario. Process of
transport to MSW treatment site is excluded, as it is common to
all the scenarios. Processes included in the scenarios are summa-
rized as follow:
(1) Infrastructure of composting, incineration, and landfill.
(2) Road transport of slag to landfill and of composted MSW to
land application.
(3) Leachate treatment.
(4) Direct emissions generated from composting, incineration,
and landfill scenarios.
(5) Material and energy production.
(6) Electricity recovery from landfill and incineration scenarios.
Life cycle inventory has been segregated to compare the envi-
ronmental impact of the various scenarios based on the results of
the same boundaries. The impact of the scenarios is the sum of
the impact generated from each process.
2.3. Methodology
The life cycle impact assessment results are calculated at mid-
point and damage level using the IMPACT 2002+ method (Jolliet
et al., 2003), due to the fact that IMPACT 2002+ model is one of
the mostly used models in LCA analysis, the fate exposure in con-
sistent way base on multimedia modeling. This method is a combi-
nation of results of the IMPACT 2002 model for human health

MSW
transport (1 t)
Chemicals and energy production

Incineration Landfill Composting Landfill Composting Incineration

(1 t) (1 t) (0.52 t) (0.79 t) (0.52 t) (0.79 t)

0.31 t 0.31 t Emissions

0.16 t
(CO2, CH4---)
Incinerated ash to
Land application Land application Landfill
landfill (206 kg)
(0.14 t) (0.14 t) (0. 16 t)

28.08 kg 0.13 t 0.10 t 53.3 kg

Leaches treatment

Impact Assessment
(Impact 2002+ method)

LCA results

Fig. 1. System boundary.

2364 J. Hong et al. / Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369

(Pennington et al., 2005), Eco-indicator 99 (Goedkoop and Spri- MSW landfill site in China (GB 16889-2008) was used to determine
ensma, 2000) and CML (Guinée et al., 2001). This approach defines water (leachate) emissions. Data on MSW composting and coal-
15 mid-point categories including carcinogens, non-carcinogens, based electricity generation were taken from the references (Hong
respiratory inorganics, ionizing radiation, ozone layer depletion, et al., 2006; Liang et al., 2008; Xiao et al., 2005).
respiratory organics, aquatic ecotoxicity, terrestrial ecotoxicity,
terrestrial acidification/nutrification, land occupation, aquatic
acidification, aquatic eutrophication, global warming, non-renew-
Table 2
able energy and mineral extraction, all of which are connected to The life cycle inventories in operation stage of each scenario (per ton dry waste).
the inventory results. These mid-point categories are structured
into four damage categories (Jolliet et al., 2003): human health Landfill Material Diesel 0.38 L
consumptiona Electricity 0.42 kwh
(including carcinogens, non-carcinogens, respiratory inorganics, consumption
ionizing radiation, ozone layer depletion, and respiratory organics Electricity 111.92 kwh
mid-points), ecosystem quality (including aquatic ecotoxicity, ter- recovery
restrial ecotoxicity, terrestrial acidification/nitrification, and land Water 0.11 m3
5
Low-density 7.54  10 m3
occupation mid-points), climate change (only including global
polyethylene
warming mid-point) and resources depletion (including non- (LDPE)
renewable energy and mineral extraction mid-points). In addition, Sand 0.41 m3
ReCiPe (mid-point E, Goedkoop et al., 2009; De Schryver et al., Pesticide 3.77  10 2 kg
2009) method is used as a comparison to complement IMPACT Direct gas CH4 230.66 kg
emissionsa NOx 8.03  10 2 kg
2002+ and check the robustness of the obtained results from IM- VOC 2.38  10 2 kg
PACT 2002+. H2S 1.31 kg
SO2 1.46  10 2 kg
Direct water COD 31.63 g
emissionsb SS 9.48 g
2.4. Inventory data sources
T-N 12.65 g
NH3–N 7.91 g
LCA was conducted in accordance with ISO 14040 standards. T-P 0.95 g
Data from China were used when available. In case that these were T-Hg 0.32 mg
not available, data and relevant background data from European T-Cr 3.16 mg
T-Cd 31.63 mg
were used (Ecoinvent Centre, 2007), including data on infrastruc-
T-Pb 31.63 mg
ture, raw materials, chemicals, energy production, slurry spreading T-As 31.63 mg
process. Incineration (Belgium Material Diesel 6.87 L
Based on the data from China, the yearly average and the life cy- Seghers SHA multi- consumptiona Electricity 152.73 kwh
grade grate) consumption
cle inventory for the operation processes (including energy and
Electricity 696.84 kwh
raw material consumption, gas, soil and water emissions) under- recovery
taken in MSW landfill and incineration sites of Suzhou in China Water 0.23 m3
were used in this study (Wei et al., 2009; He et al., 2008). The Direct gas CO 57 kg
yearly average calorific value of the MSW in Suzhou City is emissionsa,c NOx 214.54 g
PCDDs 2.92  10 7 g
5198 kJ/kg (He et al., 2008). Although significant amounts of heavy
Pb 16.60 g
metal produced from incineration of MSW has been widely re- Cr 2.09 g
ported (Abanades et al., 2002), there is still a lack of information Cd 0.57 g
on the heavy metal gas emissions in Suzhou MSW incineration Zn 3.62 g
Ni 0.38 g
sites: therefore, data on heavy metal gas emissions from MSW
Cu 3.34 g
incineration in Chongqing in China was used in this study (Song Direct water COD 9.88 kg
et al., 2009). The electricity recovery rates from methane gas and emissionsa SS 1.48 kg
waste incineration were 46 and 287 kwh/t-MSW, respectively NH3–N 997.57 g
(Wei et al., 2008, 2009). Approximately 12.2% methane gas emis- Pb 0.38 g
Ni 0.71 g
sions were used for electricity recovery in the existing Suzhou
Mn 0.91 g
landfill. In addition, the standard for pollution control in the Cu 0.21 g
Fe 30.30 g
Cr 0.85 g
Table 1 Hg 2.17  10 2 g
The domestic waste characterization factors (per ton wet waste). Land application Direct soil Organic carbon 15.28 kg
emissionsd T-N 0.55 kg
Composition (%)
T-P 0.07 kg
(a) Elementary composition T-K 6.78  10 2 kg
C 15.1 As 5.62 g
H 2.0 Hg 2.97 mg
O 12.5 Cr 5.34 g
N 0.6 Cd 0.31 g
Water content 58.9 Pb 4.86 g
(b) Fraction composition Composting (aerobic) Direct gas H2S 2.92  10 2 g
Food waste 61.4 emissionse NH3 0.61 g
Paper 11.6 Energy Electricity 19.00 kwh
Plastic 18.0 consumptione Diesel 1.75 L
Fibers 4.2 a
Wood 1.3 Wei et al. (2009).
b
Metals 0.5 GB 16889-2008.
c
Glass 1.5 Song et al. (2009).
d
Ash 1.5 Liang et al. (2008).
e
Hong et al. (2006).
 J. Hong et al. / Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369 2365

2.5. Life cycle inventory
The main characteristics of MSW considered in this study are
described in Table 1 (He et al., 2008). CO2 emissions from MSW
treatment processes are omitted from the inventory because
MSW is considered a biogenic source. However, biogenic carbon
released as methane is included. The inventory results of landfill,
incineration, road transport and composting from China data are
shown in Table 2.
3. Results
3.1. Mid-point
the global warming category, landfill and incineration had the
highest and lowest impact, respectively.
To better understand and describe the dominant pollutants in
non-carcinogens and global warming categories, the contributions
of most significant substances to these mid-points are shown in
Fig. 3. The direct arsenic emissions generated from composting
plus landfill and composting plus incineration scenarios dominated
the non-carcinogen potential impact. In incineration, the sub-
stances contributing the most to the non-carcinogen score were di-
oxin to air and arsenic to water. In landfill, the substances
contributing the most to the non-carcinogen score were hydrogen
sulfide to air and arsenic to water (Fig. 3a). For potential impact on
global warming, the direct methane emission generated from land-
fill and composting plus landfill gave the highest contributions.
However, in the two other scenarios, carbon dioxide emission

IMPACT 2002+ mid-point life cycle impact assessment results in

the four scenarios are compared in Table 3. In the carcinogens and 0.20
non-carcinogens categories, composting plus landfill and compost- 0.15 Landfill

Normalized value
ing plus incineration had the highest impact which was mainly due Incineration
0.10
to heavy metal emissions in the land application stage. In the respi- Composting+landfill
ratory inorganics, aquatic ecotoxicity, terrestrial acidification/nitri- 0.05 Composting+Incineration
fication, aquatic acidification, global warming, and non-renewable 0.00
energy categories, incineration had the lowest value due to the
electricity recovery from waste incineration. In the ionizing radia- -0.05
tion and ozone layer depletion categories, composting plus landfill -0.10

Land occupation
Global warming
Respiratory organics

Non-renewable energy
Non-carcinogens

Mineral extraction
Terrestrial ecotoxicity
Ozone layer depletion
Ionizing radiation
Respiratory inorganics
Carcinogens

Terrestrial acid/nutri
Aquatic ecotoxicity
had the highest impact due to the composting and transport
stages. In the respiratory organics categories, landfill had the high-
est impact due to the direct NOx emissions in landfill operation
stage. In the terrestrial ecotoxicity and land occupation categories,
landfill had the lowest and highest potential impact due to rela-
tively lower heavy metal emissions and higher land use, respec-
tively. In the aquatic eutrophication categories, similar potential
impacts were observed in composting plus incineration and incin-
eration due to the higher direct ammonia emissions from inciner- Fig. 2. Normalized mid-point scores for the full life cycle.

ation infrastructure stage. In the global warming category, highest

potential impact was observed in landfill because of the direct
methane gas emissions. In the mineral extraction category, higher
a
100%
potential impact was observed in incineration and composting plus b
incineration, particularly in the incineration infrastructure stage. 50%
Fig. 2 shows the normalized mid-point categories in each sce-
0%
nario. For all scenarios, the impact seen from global warming and Others
Others
H2S to air
non-carcinogens categories had an important contribution; the im- -50% Dioxins to air CH4 to air
pact seen from carcinogens, respiratory inorganics, terrestrial eco- As to water CO2 to air
As to soil
toxicity, and non-renewable energy played relatively small roles; -100%
S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4 S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4
the impact seen from the rest categories were ignorable. In com-
posting plus landfill and composting plus incineration, the impact Fig. 3. Contribution of substances to the mid-point score (a) non-carcinogens and
generated from non-carcinogens category was similarly high. In (b) global warming.

Table 3
IMPACT 2002+ mid-point results (per ton dry waste).

Categories Landfill Incineration Composting + landfill Composting + incineration

Carcinogens kg C2H3Cl eq. 0.27 0.53 18.97 19.73
Non-carcinogens kg C2H3Cl eq. 0.93 3.95 193.50 197.15
Respiratory inorganics kg PM2.5 eq. 0.03 0.20 0.00 0.14
Ionizing radiation Bq C-14 eq. 288.04 227.94 412.04 374.67
Ozone layer depletion kg CFC-11 eq. 7.47  10 6 5.73  10 6 8.30  10 6 4.98  10 6
Respiratory organics kg C2H4 eq. 1.43 0.01 1.14 0.02
Aquatic ecotoxicity kg TEG water 1.58  103 3.18  103 2.10  103 1.52  104
Terrestrial ecotoxicity kg TEG soil 491.61 1.10  104 1.15  104 2.04  104
Terrestrial acidification/nitrification kg SO2 eq. 1.10 8.04 0.30 3.93
Land occupation m2 org.arable 4.21 0.76 3.90 1.40
Aquatic acidification kg SO2 eq. 2.17 0.92 1.84 2.92
Aquatic eutrophication kg PO4 P-lim 0.00 0.22 0.03 0.20
Global warming kg CO2 eq. 1.52  103 618.47 1.22  103 38.59
Non-renewable energy MJ primary 557.36 5.73  103 74.08 656.69
Mineral extraction MJ surplus 0.27 0.89 0.49 1.04
2366 J. Hong et al. / Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369

represented the dominant contribution to potential impact on glo-
bal warming (Fig. 3b).
The contributions of most significant processes to non-carcino-
gen and global warming mid-points are shown in Fig. 4. Landfill,
incineration, and land application of composted MSW represented
the dominant contribution to non-cancer scores in the scenarios of
landfill, incineration, and composting plus landfill/composting plus
incineration, respectively (Fig. 4a). Direct emissions from incinera-
tion, landfill, and land application processes represented the dom-
inant contribution to the non-cancer scores (Fig. 4b). The potential
impact generated from electricity consumption, transport and
infrastructure was small. Similar results were also observed in glo-
bal warming category. The process of landfill and incineration rep-
resented the dominant contribution to global warming scores in
landfill/composting plus landfill and incineration/composting plus
incineration, respectively (Fig. 4a). The direct emissions from land-
fill and incineration processes played an important role, while the
potential impact generated from transport and infrastructure was
ignorable (Fig. 4b). In addition, the electricity recovery in incinera-
tion and landfill processes also played an important role to the
both non-cancer and global warming scores. Accordingly, although
data on infrastructure of incineration, composting, landfill, and
leachate treatment process in European and relevant background
data (Ecoinvent Centre, 2007) were used in this research due to
the lack of information from China, the non-cancer and global
warming potential impacts of MSW treatment were not much
affected.
3.2. Carbon balance

a Incineration Landfill To better understand the reliability of the life cycle impact
Transport Leachate treatment assessment (LCIA) mid-point results in global warming category,
Land application Composting the carbon mass balance related to direct emissions was calculated
100%
for all scenarios (Table 4). The initial carbon mass for each scenario
50% was 151 kg-C/t. The amounts of carbon in incineration, landfill,
composting plus incineration, and composting plus landfill were
0%
136.76, 134.67, 134.65, and 125.08 kg-C/t-MSW, respectively. The
-50% carbon mass loss in each scenario may have resulted from missing
inventory data and measurement error problems.
-100%
S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4 S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4
Non-carcinogens Global warming 3.3. Endpoint

Table 5 shows the damage endpoint categories in each scenario,

b Others Electricity recovery
combining all the mid-point categories into damages on human
Electricity Diesel
Transport Infrastrcture
100% Direct emissions

50% a Eleectricity recovery (kwh/t-MSW)

0 200 400 600 800
2000
Global warming potential

0% 1500 Incineration
impacts (kgCO2eq)

Landfill
1000
-50% y = -7.7x + 1867.0
500 R² = 1
-100% 0
NC GW NC GW NC GW -500 y = -2.8x + 198.1
Incineration Landfill Land R² = 1
-1000
app lication
-1500
Fig. 4. Contribution of most significant processes to (a) the mid-point score of non- -2000
carcinogens and global warming, and (b) incineration, landfill and land application
processes (NC, non-carcinogens; GW, global warming).
b Eleectricity recovery (kwh/t-MSW)
0 200 400 600 800
0
Non-renewable energy

-2 Incineration
Table 4
-4 Landfill
(GJ Primary)

Carbon balance (kg-C/t-wet waste).

-6 y = -0.03x + 2.43
Parameter Incineration Landfill Composting plus Composting
-8 R² = 1
incineration plus landfill
-10
Input 151 151 151 151
-12 y = -0.03x + 0.73
Incineration 136.76 – 115.94 –
-14 R² = 1
Landfill – 134.67 0 106.37
Composting – – 18.71 18.71 -16
Total 136.76 134.67 134.65 125.08
Lost 14.24 16.33 16.35 25.92 Fig. 5. Relationship between electricity recovery capacity and (a) global warming
potential impacts; (b) non-renewable energy.

Table 5
IMPACT 2002+ endpoint results (per ton dry waste).

Categories Landfill Incineration Composting + landfill Composting + incineration

5
Human health (DALY) 1.88  10 1.50  10 4 5.96  10 4 7.05  10 4

Ecosystem quality (PDFm2y) 7.25 79.44 95.02 167.95

Climate change (kg CO2 eq.) 1.52  103 618.466 1.22  103 38.59
Resources (MJ primary) 557.10 5.73  103 73.58 657.73
 J. Hong et al. / Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369 2367

Table 6
Recipe mid-point results (per ton dry waste).

Categories Landfill Incineration Composting + landfill Composting + incineration

3 2 3
Climate change (kg CO2 eq.) 1.66  10 6.19  10 1.33  10 38.40
Ozone depletion (kg CFC-11 eq.) 7.47  10 6 5.73  10 6 8.31  10 6 4.98  10 6
Human toxicity (kg 1,4-DB eq.) 5.26  102 2.31  103 3.33  102 1.19  103
Photochemical oxidant formation (kg NMVOC) 0.13 1.39 1.28  10 2 0.68
Particulate matter formation (kg PM10 eq.) 6.48  10 2 0.37 1.19  10 2 0.29
Ionizing radiation (kg U235 eq.) 2.76 2.18 3.95 3.59
Terrestrial acidification (kg SO2 eq.) 0.32 1.37 0.13 1.13
Freshwater eutrophication (kg P eq.) 6.34  10 3 3.28  10 2 -4.09  10 3 2.35  10 3
Marine eutrophication (kg N eq.) 2.98  10 2 0.23 -1.22  10 2 7.65  10 2
Terrestrial ecotoxicity (kg 1,4-DB eq.) 2.08  10 2 1.88 0.14 1.60
Freshwater ecotoxicity (kg 1,4-DB eq.) 0.37 1.77 -0.20 0.32
Marine ecotoxicity (kg 1,4-DB eq.) 8.36  102 3.85  103 5.26  102 5.38  102
Agricultural land occupation (m2a) 0.13 0.12 3.59 3.63
Urban land occupation (m2a) 6.72 1.02 5.72 1.78
Natural land transformation (m2) 3.83  10 2 2.63  10 2 4.50  10 2 2.53  10 2
Water depletion (m3) 0.86 0.53 0.87 0.62
Metal depletion (kg Fe eq.) 1.25 3.28 2.75 4.48
Fossil depletion (kg oil eq.) 14.13 1.37  102 2.88 14.70

health, ecosystems, climate change, and abiotic resources. In the
human health and ecosystem quality damage categories, compost-
ing plus incineration had the highest potential impacts. In the
climate change damage and resources damage categories, inciner-
ation had the lowest potential impact due to the electricity recov-
ery from waste incineration. Results seen in the damage level were
consistent with those seen in the mid-point level.
3.4. Sensitivity analysis
3.4.1. Sensitivity to electricity recovery
Fig. 5 shows the analysis of the sensitivity of electricity recovery
capacity. The potential impact on global warming and non-renew-
able energy decreased with the increasing in electricity recovery
capacity. A linear correlation between electricity recovery and
the median mid-point value for the global warming category in
landfill and incineration was observed. This linear relation shows
that a 100 kwh/t-MDW increase in electricity recovery decreases
about 770 and 280 kg CO2 eq. from the global warming potential
score in landfill and incineration, respectively. Similarly, this linear
relation also shows that a 100 kwh/t-MDW increase in electricity
recovery decreases about 3 GJ (primary) from the non-renewable
energy score in both landfill and incineration scenarios.
3.4.2. Sensitivity to impact assessment method
To confirm and add credibility to this research, the ReCiPe
method was used in comparison to IMPACT 2002+. Table 6 shows
the mid-point assessment results differentiated into each scenario
by using the ReCiPe method. The mid-point assessment results of
the ReCiPe method tended to be similar to the IMPACT 2002+ anal-
ysis results in climate change, ozone depletion, particulate matter
formation, and land occupation categories. The rest of the mid-
point assessment results were difficult to compare because the cat-
egories or label substances were significantly different. These re-
sults indicate that IMPACT 2002+ is reliable as far as this
research is concerned.
4. Discussion
Chaya and Gheewala (2007), Eriksson et al. (2005), Wei et al.
(2009), Hong et al. (2006) and Banar et al. (2009) reported on the
potential impact on aquatic acidification, global warming, and
non-renewable energy categories of MSW (wet weight) incinera-
tion process in Thailand, Sweden, China and Turkey, respectively.
Chaya and Gheewala (2007) reported that the potential impact
on aquatic acidification and non-renewable energy categories were
2.37 kg SO2 eq./t and 0.56 GJ/t, respectively. Eriksson et al. (2005)
reported that the potential impact on aquatic acidification and
global warming categories were 1.17 kg SO2 eq./t and
339 kg CO2 eq./t, respectively. Wei et al. (2009) reported that the
potential impact on global warming was 330 kg CO2 eq./t. Hong
et al. (2006) reported that the potential impact on aquatic acidifi-
cation, global warming, and non-renewable energy categories were
0.51 kg SO2 eq./t, 229 kg CO2 eq./t and 0.32 GJ/t, respectively.
Banar et al. (2009) reported that the potential impact on acidificat-
ion and global warming categories were 38.3 kg SO2 eq./t and
1510 CO2 eq./t, respectively. The reported potential impact on
aquatic acidification and global warming in Turkey was signifi-
cantly higher than in other countries. In this study, mid-point
LCIA results showed that the potential impact per ton MSW
(wet weight) on aquatic acidification, global warming, and non-
renewable energy categories of incineration process were
0.38 kg SO2 eq./t, 254 kg CO2 eq./t, and 0.72 GJ/t, respectively.
Worth noting is the omission of CO2 emissions from incineration
from the current study because MSW is considered a biogenic
sources. If CO2 emissions from incineration (501 kg CO2/t-wet
MSW) are included, the global warming potential impact in the
incineration scenario will be 247 kg CO2 eq./t-wet MSW. These re-
sults were similar with those of the above-mentioned studies (Cha-
ya and Gheewala, 2007; Eriksson et al., 2005; Hong et al., 2006).
Arena et al. (2003), Eriksson et al. (2005), Banar et al. (2009),
and Mendes et al. (2004) reported potential impact on aquatic
acidification, global warming, and non-renewable energy catego-
ries of MSW (wet weight) landfill process in Italy, Sweden, Turkey,
and Brazil, respectively. Arena et al. (2003) reported that the
potential impact on aquatic acidification, global warming, and
non-renewable energy categories were 0.44 kg SO2 eq./t,
490 kg CO2 eq./t, and 0.67 GJ/t, respectively. Eriksson et al.
(2005) reported that the potential impact on aquatic acidification
and global warming categories were 0.99 kg SO2 eq./t and
580 kg CO2 eq./t, respectively. Banar et al. (2009) reported that
the potential impact on aquatic acidification and global warming
categories were 43.6 kg SO2 eq./t and 6990 kg CO2 eq./t, respec-
tively. Mendes et al. (2004) reported that the potential impacts
on aquatic acidification, global warming, and non-renewable en-
ergy categories were 0.30 kg SO2 eq./t, 900 kg CO2 eq./t, and
1.83 GJ/t, respectively. In this study, mid-point LCIA results showed
that the potential impacts per ton MSW (wet weight) on aquatic
acidification, global warming, and non-renewable energy catego-
2368 J. Hong et al. / Waste Management 30 (2010) 2362–2369
ries of landfill process were 0.89 kg SO2 eq./t, 625 kg CO2 eq./t, and
0.07 GJ/t, respectively. Here, it is important to note that the IM-
PACT 2002+ method considering a 500-year time horizon in global
warming category, the global warming potential of CH4 is
7 kg CO2 eq./kg CH4. If the global warming potential impact of a
100-year time horizon (25 kg CO2 eq./kg CH4) is used in this study,
the global warming potential impact of this research will be
2338 kg CO2 eq./t, which is much higher than the results of the re-
search involving Italy, Sweden, and Brazil (Arena et al., 2003; Eriks-
son et al., 2005; Mendes et al., 2004). However, the aquatic
acidification and non-renewable energy potential impacts of the
landfill process in this research have values within the ranges seen
in the studies mentioned earlier. The higher global warming poten-
tial impact is mainly caused by the relatively lower methane gas
usages for electricity recovery. Life cycle impact assessment mid-
point and endpoint results showed that landfill, and composting
plus landfill had higher environmental impacts due to the global
warming gas from methane emissions (Fig. 4). However, electricity
recovery from methane gas can significantly reduce the non-
renewable energy and global warming scores, thereby reducing
as well the overall environmental impact. As mentioned earlier,
only 12.2% methane is used for electricity recovery in landfill
(46 kwh/t-wet MSW). If all methane gases are consumed for elec-
tricity recovery, the potential impact of landfill for the global
warming and non-renewable energy categories will be reduced
to 1.0 ton CO2 eq./t-wet MSW and 1.2 GJ/t-wet MSW, respec-
tively. Similarly, only 20% calorific value of MDW is used for elec-
tricity recovery (287 kwh/t-wet MSW) in incineration. If the
energy conversion efficiency for electricity production is increased
to 40% (around 600 kwh/t-wet MSW), the potential impact of land-
fill for the global warming and non-renewable energy categories
will be reduced to -1.5 ton CO2 eq./t-wet MSW and 1.8 GJ/t-
wet MSW, respectively.
In addition, life cycle impact assessment endpoint results
showed that composting plus incineration scenario had the highest
impact in the human health and ecosystem quality damage catego-
ries (Fig. 5), because of the heavy metal emissions from land appli-
cation process. This is consistent with results of previous studies
showing that the composted MSW can increase heavy metals bur-
den of soil (Ramos and López-Acevedo, 2004).
Moreover, as compared to EU reference (BREF, 2006), the direct
heavy metal air emissions of the incineration process in this study
exceed EU best available technology in one or two orders of mag-
nitude. If the heavy metal air emission data of EU are used (BREF,
2006), the potential impact of incineration for the cancer and
non-cancer categories will be reduced to 0.28 kg C2H3Cl eq. and
4.68 kg C2H3Cl eq., respectively. The above information identified
the MSW treatment level and the improve potentials of incinera-
tion and landfill scenarios. The life cycle inventories, the potential
impact seen in incineration and landfill in this research, and the
sensitivity studies of electricity recovery will be very helpful to
the decision making with regards to the construction of MSW
treatment plant by policymakers in China.
5. Conclusions
This study introduced the four most used MSW treatment man-
agement scenarios in China. Results were characterized and com-
pared with those in other parts of the world. To confirm and add
credibility to the study, sensitivity analysis was conducted. Re-
search results will be very helpful to increase the life cycle inven-
tory database of China and provide useful and scientific
information for policymakers in China in making decisions regard-
ing to the construction of MSW treatment plants. The main conclu-
sions that can be drawn from this study are:
 In all scenarios, the impact generated from global warming and
non-carcinogens categories have a dominant contribution.
 In all scenarios, the impacts on carcinogens, respiratory inor-
ganics, terrestrial ecotoxicity, and non-renewable energy play
a relative small role; the impacts on the rest of the categories
are ignorable.
 Direct emissions from incineration, landfill, and land applica-
tion processes represented the dominant contribution to the
global warming and non-carcinogens scores.
 Mid-point LCIA results on aquatic acidification, global warming,
and non-renewable energy categories of incineration and land-
fill processes are consistent with results of previously reported
studies.
 Electricity recovery from methane gas and waste incineration
can significantly reduce the non-renewable energy and global
warming scores of landfill and incineration scenarios, respec-
tively, thereby reducing as well the overall environmental
impact.
 In the global warming, and non-renewable energy categories,
incineration had the lowest value due to the electricity recovery
from waste incineration, and therefore, incineration is a good
choice for MSW treatment in China.
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