Benefit of composting application over landfill on municipal solid waste management in Phnom Penh, Cambodia

This paper presents an insight into benefits of organic waste recycling through composting over landfill on municipal solid waste management in Phnom Penh, in terms of greenhouse gases (GHGs) mitigation. Future waste generation from 2003 to 2020 was forecasted and four scenarios of organic waste recycling were carried out. Organic waste food and garden waste were used for composting and the remaining waste was landfilled. The recycling scenarios were set based on organic waste generated from difference sources; scenario 1: no recycling, scenario 2: household organic waste; scenario 3: market, restaurant, school and hotel organic waste, and scenario 4: all generated organic waste. The results showed that MSW generation in MPP increased significantly from about 0.24 million ton in 2003 to 0.41 million ton in 2010 and was projected to reach 1.02 million tons in 2020. Composting gave better benefit than landfill. It could reduce GHGs emission of 36.2%, 12.8% and 65.0% from scenario 2, scenario 3 and scenario 4 compared with scenario 1 (all generated waste is landfilled), respectively. These percentages reflect the amount of GHGs emission of 3.23, 1.14 and 5.79 million tons CO(2)eq from the above respective scenarios. Hence, composting could be a potential GHGs mitigation option for MPP.