Study on Rural Solid Waste Collection and Transportation Mode and Route Optimization Strategy in the Cold Regions of Northern China

Rural vitalization is a major strategy for reform and development of agriculture and rural areas in China,the key task of which is improving rural living environment.Imperfect rural solid waste(RSW)collection and transportation system exacerbates the pollution of RSW to rural living environment,while it has not been established and improved in the cold region of Northern China due to climate and economy.Through the analysis of the current situation of RSW source separation,collection,transportation and disposal in China,an RSW collection and transportation system suitable for the northern cold region was developed.Considering the low winter temperature in the northern cold region,different requirements for RSW collection,transportation and terminal disposal,scattered source points and single terminal disposal nodes in rural areas,the study focused on determining the number and location of transfer stations,established a model for transfer stations selection and RSW collection and transportation routes optimization for RSW collection and transportation system,and proposed the elite retention particle swarm optimization–genetic algorithm(ERPSO–GA).The rural area of Baiquan County was taken as a representative case,the collection and transportation scheme of which was given,and the feasibility of the scheme was clarified by simulation experiment.

Preliminary techno-economic analysis of three typical decentralized composting technologies treating rural kitchen waste:a case study in China

This study was designed to evaluate whether the decentralized rural kitchen waste(KW)composting technologies used in China can be widely applied.To this end,we completed a techno-economic analysis of three typical types of KW compositing,namely solar-assisted(SAC),bio-enhanced(BEC),and heat-dewatering composting(HDC).These evaluations revealed that all three technologies produce composting products that meet China’s organic fertilizer standard and that both SAC and BEC are economically self-sustaining and generate net profits(18824.94 and 17791.52 US$/a)and positive net present values(32133.11 and 25035.93 US$).Subsequent sensitivity analysis demonstrated that the KW-handling subsidy plays a critical role in making decentralized composting economically attractive.Based on these analyses,we believe that reducing the coverage area of SAC,reducing the operating cost of BEC and HDC,upgrading composting products,and strengthening secondary pollution control would aid in supporting the technological improvement of these processes.Moreover,providing appropriate subsidies and promulgating specific standards and policies for KW fertilizer are key strategies for decentralized rural KW composting management.

A comprehensive overview of rural solid waste management in China

This paper aims to conduct a comprehensive review of rural solid waste （RSW） in terms of character- istics, management and legislation. Survey results show that RSW generation rates range from 0.25 to 2.1 kg · （capita.d）-1 in different rural villages across regions of China. Total RSW generation has been increasing, which is far higher than official data in 2014. RSW are dominated by food residue and coal ash/cinder/dust （at approximately 70%）. Most of RSW are still discarded randomly without any treatment in China. Scattered RSW generation sources, imperfect legislation system, poor infrastructure on treat- ment and disposal are identified as the biggest challenge for RSW management currently in China. To improve RSW management, increasing financial resources, estab- lishing sorting collection and transportation network, promoting sorting collection and recycling, improving treatment technology are proposed as the possible solution.

Role of rural solid waste management in non-point source pollution control of Dianchi Lake catchments, China

In recent years,with control of the main muni-cipal and industrial point pollution sources and imple-mentation of cleaning for some inner pollution sources in the water body,the discharge of point source pollution decreased gradually,while non-point source pollution has become increasingly distressing in Dianchi Lake catch-ments.As one of the major targets in non-point source pollution control,an integrated solid waste controlling strategy combined with a technological solution and man-agement system was proposed and implemented based on the waste disposal situation and characteristics of rural solid waste in the demonstration area.As the key techno-logy in rural solid waste treatment,both centralized plant-scale composting and a dispersed farmer-operated waste treating system showed promise in rendering timely ben-efits in efficiency,large handling capacity,high quality of the end product,as well as good economic return.Problems encountered during multi-substrates co-com-posting such as pathogens,high moisture content,asyn-chronism in the decomposition of different substrates,and low quality of the end product can all be tackled.92.5% of solid waste was collected in the demonstration area,while the treating and recycling ratio reached 87.9%,which pre-vented 32.2 t nitrogen and 3.9 t phosphorus per year from entering the water body of Dianchi Lake after imple-mentation of the project.