Systematic Review of Sustainability Assessment Methodologies, Indicators, and Decision-Making Tools for Municipal Solid Waste Management

Abstract

Municipal solid waste (MSW) is projected to increase continuously, reaching 3.88 billion tonnes by 2050. Inadequate municipal solid waste management (MSWM) causes pollution, human health issues, and climate change, hindering the sustainable development goals. Sustainable MSWM plays an essential role in addressing these issues. Previous studies implementing various sustainability assessment methodologies to evaluate the environmental, social, and economic impacts of MSWM approaches faced various methodological challenges that require future development. This study aimed to conduct a systematic review of sustainability assessment methodologies applied in MSWM worldwide, identifying tools and existing methodological gaps. Relevant articles from four major online databases have been identified: Scopus, Web of Science, Science Direct, and PubMed. In total, fifty-eight articles were analyzed to provide an in-depth understanding of the application of sustainability assessment methodologies. The findings indicated that an integrated assessment and LCSA were the most common approaches. Reliability of sustainability assessment was challenged by three main gaps: a lack of standardized methodologies, parameter uncertainty, and subjectivity in decision-making caused by inconsistent stakeholder selection and weighting. To address these gaps, future assessments must enhance robustness by developing a standardized framework tailored to local contexts, improving data quality procedures, refining weighting methods by combining subjective and mathematical approaches, and ensuring diverse stakeholder involvement throughout the assessment process.