Environmental Sustainability Assessment of a Multifunctional Process: Municipal SOLID Waste Incineration in the Iberian Peninsula

The objective of municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI) is to treat waste by reducing the waste mass and allowing energy recovery. Nevertheless, this treatment has a bad reputation due to the emission of ultratoxic pollutants. In this study Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) was applied to assess the advantages, drawbacks, and environmental impacts of this technology. In particular, a multifunctional model for MSWI in the Iberian Peninsula was developed. Moreover, to reduce the LCA complexity, this work proposes a technical way to carry out the Environmental Sustainability Assessment (ESA) of MSWI using two objectives: Natural Resources Sustainability (NRS) and Environmental Burdens Sustainability (EBS). EBS are normalised based on the threshold values of the European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register E-PRTR, whereas NRS are normalised based on the average consumption of natural resources of the Spanish. This methodology will help the decision maker at choosing the best option reducing the LCA complexity