Landfill Site Selection Using GIS and Multi-criteria Decision-making AHP and SAW Methods: A Case Study in Sulaimaniyah Governorate, Iraq

• Lack of land for waste disposal is one of the main problems facing urban areas in developing countries. The Sulaimaniyah Governorate, located in Northern Iraq, is one of the main cities of the country in the Kurdistan Region, covering an area of 2400 km2. Currently, there is no landfill site in the study region that meets the scientific and environmental requirements, and the inappropriate dumping of solid waste causes adverse effects to the environment, economic and urban aesthetic. To overcome this phenomenon, it is crucial to suggest a landfill site, even in countries that recycle or burn their waste to protect the environment. Landfill sites should be carefully selected taking into account all regulations and other restrictions. The integration of geographic information systems and the multi-criteria decision analysis were used in this study to select suitable landfill locations in the region. To this end, thirteen layers prepared according to their importance including slope, geology, land use, urban area, villages, rivers, groundwater, slope, elevation, soil, geology, road, oil and gas, land use, archaeology and power lines. Two different methods (simple additive weighting and analytic hierarchy process) were implemented in a geographical information system to obtain the suitability index map for candidate landfill sites, where all these conditions satisfied the scientific and environmental criteria adopted in this study. The comparison of the maps resulting from these two different methods demonstrates that both methods produced consistent results.

Subject headings

TEKNIK OCH TEKNOLOGIER  -- Naturresursteknik -- Fjärranalysteknik (hsv//swe)

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY  -- Environmental Engineering -- Remote Sensing (hsv//eng)

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Geovetenskap och miljövetenskap -- Naturgeografi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Earth and Related Environmental Sciences -- Physical Geography (hsv//eng)

TEKNIK OCH TEKNOLOGIER  -- Naturresursteknik -- Annan naturresursteknik (hsv//swe)

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY  -- Environmental Engineering -- Other Environmental Engineering (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Criteria weights

GIS software

Simple additive weighting (SAW) method

Analytic hierarchy process (AHP)

Landfill site

Soil Mechanics

Geoteknik

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kon (subject category)