Journal of Environment and Waste Management

JEWM

Vol. 2(2), pp. 071-078, June, 2015. www.premierpublishers.org, ISSN: 1936-8798x

Research Article

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the

Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy
logic in a GIS environment
TM Bilintoh1 and E Stemn2
1

Geosurvey Engineering (Ghana) Limited, P. O. Box 2363, Accra, Ghana.

Environmental and Safety Engineering Department, University of Mines and Technology, P. O. Box 237 Tarkwa,
Ghana.
2

One of the threats to global environmental health is waste generation. Growth in population
as well as rise in the quantity of municipal solid waste generated has made it difficult to
locate appropriate site for waste disposal in most urban areas. Land filling is now accepted
as the most widely used method for addressing this problem in all countries of the world.
However, appropriate site selection for land filling is a problem in waste management and
therefore needs to be addressed. This research sought to identify a suitable landfill site for
waste disposal in Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis of Ghana. To achieve this, Geographical
Information System (GIS), Fuzzy Logic and Multi-criteria Evaluation (MCE) were applied in
order to display and rank candidate sites. The analysis was limited to criteria that were
selected and relevant to the area under investigation. The results obtained provide clear
areas for landfill sites in the study area and finally arrives at suitable areas.
Keywords: Fuzzy, GIS, landfill, multi-criteria, weighted linear combination

INTRODUCTION
One of the unavoidable products of the human society
is Municipal Solid Waste (MSW). The increasing trends
in the generation of MSW in time past led to the
establishment of a management system known as the
municipal solid waste management system (MSWMS)
which has gained popularity in recent past (Rafiee et
al., 2011). The MSWMS is an integrated approach of
managing MSW and involves several techniques
involving
recycling,
recovering,
reuse,
incineration/gasification, composting and landfilling
(Tchobanoglous et al., 1993). Even though, there is a
worldwide convergence on waste reuse and recycling,
landfill stills becomes unavoidable in the MSWMS
especially in most developing countries such as Ghana.
In most developing countries, the technical know-how
and the finance required to engage recycling of MSW is
readily non-available and therefore many resort to the
use of landfill as the cheapest mean of managing
MSW.
In Ghana, the country is seriously plagued with several
waste generation problems. According to GEPA (2002),

there is an increased concern for MSW management,

this is due to increased production of MSW, especially
in large urban areas. Based on an estimated population
of 20 million and an average daily waste production per
capita of 0.45 kg, Ghana generates annually about 3.3
million tons of solid waste. The quantities of waste
generated are increasing rapidly and may double by the
next decade (GEPA, 2002).Municipal solid waste has
been disposed of anywhere anyhow without regard to
the nuisance and harm caused to the environment.
Improved waste disposal is therefore called for by the
Governments Environmental Sanitation Policy, in
pursuit of the development and maintenance of a clean,
safe and pleasant physical environment in all human
settlements to promote the social, economic and
physical wellbeing of all sections of the population.

*Corresponding Author: Environmental and Safety

Engineering Department, University of Mines and
Technology, P. O. Box 237 Tarkwa, Ghana,
estemn@umat.edu.gh

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

Bilintoh and Stemn

071

It was due to this that necessitated the development of

the Landfill Guideline by the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA). The purpose of the guideline was to
provide the basis upon which the EPA will issue
Environmental Permits and Certificates and District
Assemblies will issue and renew licences for landfill
operations in the country.
A landfill is a large area of land or an excavated site
that is specifically designed and built to receive wastes
(USEPA, 2014). Landfills and related MSW facilities are
becoming difficult to locate in urban areas because of a
shortage of large tracts of land and community
opposition (Rafiee et al., 2011). The not in my
backyard (NIMBY) and build absolutely nothing
anywhere near anyone and not on planet Earth
syndromes have become popular, creating a
tremendous pressure on decision makers in selecting
sites for MSW facilities. All these make site selection of
landfill very challenging especially in urban areas like
the Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis (Rafiee, 2007).
Therefore there is the need to adopt methods that will
incorporate all these concerns during the selection of
site for landfill. One of the main goals of the MSWMS is
to determine the type, location, and capacity of facilities
that will be used for disposal and/or treatment of the
waste, based on environmental, economic, social, and
health considerations. Therefore, suitable location of
disposal facilities is a major issue in waste
management.
Over the years several methodologies have been
applied for sitting a landfill in combination with GIS,
such as, expert systems, raster-based C programs with
optimal compactness, multi-criteria analysis (Lin et al.,
1999).Mahamid et al. (2010), in an effort to site an
appropriate landfill for Ramallah Governorate in
Palestine, used thematic maps to create vulnerability
map for the area and the result was compiled to the
buffer zones around sensitive areas by using multicriteria analysis in GIS. Javaheri et al. (2006)adopted
GIS as a tool to evaluate the suitability of the vicinity of
Giroft city in Kerman province of Iran for a landfill using
several criteria such as water permeability, slope,
distance from rivers, depth of underground water table,
distance from residential areas, distance from
generation centres and distance from roads.
Considering relative priority of all criteria in comparison
with others, a specific weight was designated to each
criterion according to their total influence on the whole
process of decision making. Furthermore, Zeinhom et
al. (2009) used an integration of GIS and Multi-Criteria
Decision Making (MCDM) to locate a landfill sites in
Mansoura city, Egypt. In their research, eight criteria
were used. They used both Weighted Linear
Combination (WLC) and Analytical Hierarchy Process
(AHP) in a GIS environment(Zeinhom et al., 2009).
In this study, WLC was implemented in a GIS-Fuzzy
Logic environment to locate a site for landfill in the
Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis of Ghana.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Study Area
Size and Location
Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis, the capital of the Western
Region of Ghana is located between Latitude 4 52' 30"
N and 5 04' 00" N and Longitudes 1 37' 00" W and 1
52' 30"W. The Metropolis is surrounded by the Mpohor
Wassa District to the north, the south by the Gulf of
Guinea, the West and East by the Ahanta West District
the Shama District respectively. The metropolis is
strategically located in the south-western part of the
country, about 242 km to the west of Accra and
approximately 280 km from the La Cte dIvoire in the
west. The Metropolis lies within the South-Western
Equatorial Zone. It therefore has fairly uniform
o
o
temperature, ranging between 22 C in August and 30 C
in March. (Stemn et al., 2014; Kumi-Baoteng et al.,
2015). The metropolis is the smallest (with a land size
2
of 230 km ) among the 22 districts in the Western
Region but however the most developed and populated
in the region. It is the third largest metropolis in Ghana
(STMA, 2006). Figure 1 is a map of the study area.
Waste Management in Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis
The collection, transportation and final disposal of both
solid and liquid waste is the responsibility of the Waste
Management Department, a department within the
Metropolitan Assembly. A total of 206 kg per day with a
collection rate of 70% is the estimated solid waste
generated within the metropolis. According to FeiBaffoe et al. (2014), the capita waste output in the city
is estimated at 0.6 kg.
Just like most cities in Ghana, waste generated at
source is stored using various containers ranging from
plastic bags, paper boxes, baskets, unused buckets, or
any container considered appropriate for such purpose
(Kreith, 1994). Nonetheless, some high to middle
income household within the metropolis store their solid
waste in dustbin with proper covering. Additionally,
sorting and segregation of waste at source is not a
common practice within the metropolis (Fei-Baffoe et
al., 2014).
Solid waste collection system employed within the
metropolis is of two main types and is either on a
franchise or contract basis. The major cities and towns
within the municipality have been zoned into units and
private waste collection company have been assigned
the responsibility of collecting and transporting solid
waste from the various zones to the final disposal site.
The two main methods of solid waste collection within
the metropolis are the door to door collection and the
communal waste container system (Fei-Baffoe et al.,
2014). All wastes collected within the metropolis are
disposed of at the newly constructed landfill at
Sofokrom, a suburb of Essipon in the Sekondi-Takoradi
Metropolis.

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

J. Environ. Waste Manag.

072

Figure 1. Map of the Study Area

Table 1. Datasets used for the Study

Dataset

Scale or Resolution

Source

DEM

30 m By 30 m

US Geological Survey

Properties (Settlement)

1 : 50 000

Town and Country Department

Roads

1 : 50 000

Survey and Mapping Division of Ghana

Water Bodies

1 : 50 000

Survey and Mapping Division of Ghana

Materials
In this research, several datasets, both vector and
raster at different scales were used. These data were
obtained from different sectors based on availability
and suitability for the purpose of the study. Table 1
show the datasets used together with their sources.

a landfill site. Apart from these criteria, constraints such

as 2 km from recreational site and protected areas, 5
km from airport and 2 km from institution such as
schools and hospitals were also used in the suitability
evaluation process (Nilchiyan, 2002; USEPA, 2004;
Ayat, 2006; Rafiee et al., 2011).

Methods

Selection and Standardisation of Criteria

This research made use of fuzzy logic in a GIS

environment to determine a suitable site for landfill. The
fuzzy logic method is one of the most widely used GISbased decision rules. This is because unlike Classic
Boolean logic which is binary, fuzzy logic permits the
notion of difference in shades of colour, meaning and
expression (Zadeh, 1965). The methodology adopted
was divided into four main procedures namely;
determination of criteria and constraints; development
of attributes of each criteria and standardisation of each
criterion unto a common scale; determination of degree
of influence of each criterion and finally combination of
all the criteria to determine the suitability index. Four
criteria namely, properties, water bodies, roads and
slope were used to evaluate the suitability of a land as

This first step involved the selection of the criteria for

the evaluation. At this stage, several criteria were
considered however due to unavailability of data, some
were rejected; thus the criteria were selected solely
based on the availability of data. Database was
developed for each of the criterion and was followed by
standardisation of each criterion with regards to the
suitability for locating a landfill site. Data was imported
from a vector format into a raster format at a pixel size
of 30 m. This was necessary because the dataset
required for the use of fuzzy logic in the GIS
environment is raster. A straight line distance was used
to determine the distance from a fixed point to all other
points on water bodies, properties and road raster
maps.

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

Bilintoh and Stemn

073

Table 2. Rating of Each Criterion

Rating
Suitability Level

Road

Water Bodies

Property

Elevation

0.0000 - 0.1172

0.0000 - 0.1211

0.0000 - 0.1133

0.0000 - 0.1133

Highly Suitable

0.1172 - 0.3633

0.1211 - 0.3633

0.1133 - 0.3398

0.1133 - 0.3398

Suitable

0.3633 - 0.6133

0.3633 - 0.6133

0.3398 - 0.5898

0.3398 - 0.5898

Fairly suitable

0.6133 - 0.8672

0.6133 - 0.8672

0.5898 - 0.8555

0.5898 - 0.8555

Low Suitability

0.8672 - 1.0000

0.8672- 1.0000

0.8555 - 1.0000

0.8555 - 1.0000

Unsuitable

The four criteria selected could be grouped into two

main categories: (1) favourable (would result in higher
suitability) and (2) unfavourable (would result in lower
suitability). The suitability score of each criterion was
standardised with a fuzzy subset membership (Rafiee
et al., 2011). Fuzzy logic was introduced to supplement
interpretation of intangible factors or measured
uncertainties. Unlike the Boolean set, boundaries in the
fuzzy set are not sharply defined. In this way, the fuzzy
set provides a convenient way to treat intangible
environmental phenomena. As a result of the logic
behind fuzzy set memberships as well as the possibility
of creating a continuous scale map in GIS, fuzzy set
memberships are highly appealing in criteria
standardization (Jiang et al., 2000; Rafiee et al., 2011).
Rasteralgebra was used to execute fuzzy analysis on
each map generated. To do this, information obtained
with regard to siting of landfills was used as the criteria
to write logical statements using the fuzzy logic
membership function shown in equation 1(Karkazi et
al., 2001).
A (X) = {0, x a, (x-a)/(b-a)} a x b, 1, x b; x X
Equation (1)
Where A represents the fuzzy membership function, X
is the universal set with a and b being the limits or
internal of that universal set and x is a member of the
universal set whose upper limit is b (standardized as 1)
and lower limit is a (standardized as 0).
This logical statement was used to create fuzzy
membership functions for all the criteria as shown
below. The map layers were standardized using fuzzy
set membership functions in a GIS environment.
According toRafiee et al. (2011), there are variety of
functions that could be used for fuzzy set membership
standardization, including sigmoidal, J-shaped and
linear functions. To apply each of these, there is the
need to define control points for the standardization
curve (Eastman, 2009). In this research, a linear
function membership standardisation was used to
assign rank to each of the four criteria in a range of 0 to
1.
Negative public reaction and general opposition from
people living close to transfer stations and landfills are
well documented(Omrani et al., 1998; Ayat, 2006). The
distance between the settlements (residential and
commercial areas) and the landfill site is therefore
important. The properties map obtained from the Town
and Country Planning Department of the Metropolis at

a scale of 1:50 000 was used as an imput to create a

straight line distance map. Areas within 1 km of
residences were considered unsuitable with the
suitability values increasing linearly from 0 to 1 for
locations between 1 km and 5 km from residences; the
highest value was assigned for locations beyond 5 km
from residences(Rafiee et al., 2011).
Streams and rivers channels within 1 km were
classified as unsuitable whiles those beyond 3 km were
considered unsuitable; those between 1 km and 3 km
were considered suitable with land suitability increasing
linearly from 0 to 1.
Current highway data obtained from the Survey and
Mapping Division was used to determined the suitability
of the landfill. Locations within 500 m and beyond 5 km
from a highway were considered unsuitable. Locations
situated between 1 km to 4 km from the highway were
considered more suitable.
Slope class was determined from the digital elevation
model obtained from the United State Geological
Survey (USGS). According to Makhdum (1993), areas
with a slope of >9 were considered unsuitable and
were assigned a score of 0; slopes measuring from 0
to 6were considered most suitable, receiving a score
of 1 (Rafiee et al., 2011).
The results obtained from the fuzzy analysis were
reclassified into various sections of suitability ranging
from unsuitable to highly suitable. However since
unsuitability for one criterion might reflect high
suitability for other criterion, as in the case of the
elevation and property criteria the reclassification was
done separately for each criterion. Table 2 shows the
reclassified rating for each of the criterion.
Assignment of Weights to the Criteria
Since each criterion has a certain degree of
importance, the concept of weighting was employed to
give the required levels of importance to each criterion.
This was essential because all the criteria were not of
equal significance. According to Kirkwood (1997), one
of two methods could be adopted in ensuring that each
criterion is evaluated based on its relative importance.
The first approach consist of selecting the same
numerical range (01) for each of the various criteria
and then assigning each criterion a score based on its
weight, and finally multiplying each standardised

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

J. Environ. Waste Manag.

074

Table 3. Weight of each Criterion

Criteria

Weight

Water body fuzzy map

0.35

Property fuzzy map

0.30

Road fuzzy map

0.20

Elevation fuzzy map

0.15

Total

1.00

criterion by the value assigned to its relative weight to

calculate its suitability index. In the second approach, a
variable numerical range is used for the various criteria
depending upon the relative importance of each
criterion (Rafiee et al., 2011). In this research the first
method was adopted.
There exist several methods by which the weight of
criterion is determined. These methods includes, the
pairwise comparison method, the ratio methods, the
ranking methods and the trade-off analysis methods
(Malczewki, 1999).
In this research the ranking method was adopted. The
various criteria were ranking after a thorough
discussion with city planner and various stakeholders.
These ranks were also determined from knowledge
obtained from the current landfill within the metropolis.
The engineers that sited and constructed the current
landfill were consulted to provide information on how
the relative importance of each of the criterion was
determined. It was observed from the field consultation
that, nearness to water body should be ranked highest
among all the four criteria whiles slope receives the
lowest rank. Table 3 shows the weights that were
determined from the ranking method.
Combination of Criteria to Determine Suitability Index
The various maps obtained after the fuzzy analysis was
then combined to generate a single map, showing
areas of different suitability levels for siting a landfill
within the study area. In this research, the Weighted
Linear Combination (WLC) method was used to
combine the criteria and compute the suitability index.
The WLC method was chosen over the Boolean
Intersection (BI) and the Ordered Weighting Average
(OWA) because it is simpler and the most widely
applied method (Malczewki, 2004; Rafiee et al., 2011).
Using the WLC method, the suitability index was
calculated by summing the product of each of the
weight of each criterion with its standard score
according to equation 2.

Suitabilit y Index w i x i
Equation (2)
Where wi is the weight of each criterion i and xi is the
standardised score (0-1) of each criterion.

Selection of the Best Site

After obtaining the suitability index, there was the need
to select best sites that should be considered for the
landfill. In doing this, the constraint map which was
obtained by applying a Boolean logic was used.
Suitability score was then determined from the product
of the constraints and the suitability index using
equation 3.

Suitabilit y Score w i x i C j

Equation (3)

Where Cj is the score of constraint j and is the

product sign for the constraints. This means that the
product of the constraint was multiplied by the suitability
index of each pixel. In selecting the best site, a
minimum suitability score of 0.65 was determined for
suitability and land area of 20 ha to accommodate
vehicles and equipment as well as to provide additional
space for future expansion. The 20 ha was determined
through several consultations with city planners.
According to the Ghana Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), waste generation in the proposed
catchment area should be estimated from the existing
population and expected growth rate; this was done
accordingly. Additionally, domestic solid waste
production can be estimated as about 0.45 kg per
person per day. Extra quantities of waste such as those
generated from major market, commercial areas and
industrial activities were all considered during the
determination of the minimum land area for the landfill
site (GEPA, 2002).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

Results
Generation of Straight Line Distance and Slope
Figure 2 shows the straight line distances that were
generated from the properties, water bodies and roads
datasets after it was converted to a raster format. The
figure also shows the slope map in degrees that was
generated from the DEM. There was the need to
generate straight line distances because the landfill site
should be of a certain distance from those datasets
(properties, water bodies, roads).

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

Bilintoh and Stemn

075

a.

b.

c.
d.
Figure 2. Map Showing Straight line Distance and Slope of Evaluated Criteria for the Landfill Site
(a: straight line distance from properties to all points, b: straight line distance from water bodies to
all points, c: straight line distance from roads to all points, d: slope in degrees)

Standardisation of Criteria

Discussions

Figure 3 are map that shows all the criteria after they
were standardised by the assignment of fuzzy
membership based on an evaluation scale of 0 to 1.

To ascertain the accuracy and reliability of the selected

best site, spatial autocorrelation was conducted. This
has the capability to determine the total area threshold
and the suitability threshold; and accordingto Eastman
(2009) and Rafiee et al. (2011), it refers to the
correlation between each pixel and its neighbouring
pixels. In this research, spatial autocorrelation was
carried out to ensure that the Fuzzy-GIS-WLC
approach which was used worked correctly for all the
best selected sites. The spatial autocorrelation for sites
1, 2, 3 and 4 were 0.92, 0.95, 0.90 and 0.89 which
indicate a high spatial autocorrelation.
In the determination of the final best four sites, the
prevailing wind of the entire study was also considered.
Prevailing wind refers to the wind direction mostly
observed in an area during a given time period. In order
to determine the prevailing wind, a 20 year data of both
wind direction and wind speed was obtained from the
Ghana Meteorological Agency and used to generate a
wind rose diagram. The wind rose diagrams showed
that the prevailing wind emanates from South-Western

Suitability Index
The Suitability Index (SI) of landfill for the study area is
shown in Figure 4. Suitability index values ranged from
0 to 1, with higher index values showing greater
suitability of land for siting a landfill. The index values
were reclassified into five levels of suitability ranging
from unsuitable to very highly suitable. Table 4 shows
these suitability classes as well as their corresponding
index values and total area.
Selection of Best Sites
Applying the constraint map together with a minimum
area of 20 ha, 4best sites were selected from the very
highly suitable class range. These potential sites
together with the constraints are shown in Figure 5.

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

J. Environ. Waste Manag.

076

Figure 3.Maps showing suitability of evaluation (standardised) criteria for landfill site (a: distance to settlement;
b: distance to water bodies; c: distance to roads; d: slope)

Figure 4. Landfill Suitability Index of the Study Area

direction to the North-Eastern direction. All the four best

sites were located in the northern part of the study
areas and therefore all of them could be developed with
minimal mitigation. For site 1, no mitigation plan is
required since it is located in the North-East; the
prevailing wind which emanates from South-West
would have reduced before arriving in the NorthEastern side. In order to avoid the transfer and

deposition of pollutants from the landfill sites into

residential areas, the wind rose was used to rank the
four best sites. Site 1 had the highest rank followed by
site 4 and 2 with site 3 having the lowest rank.
Other factors should be considered in making a choice
on which of the best site to select. According to Rafiee
et al. (2011), economic factors such as cost of land
acquisition, cost of development and operation of the

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

Bilintoh and Stemn

077

Table 4. Suitable Classes with their Areas

Area
Suitability Index

Class Name

0.00 - 0.10

Ha

Unsuitable

8748.36

40.23

0.10 - 0.20

Low Suitable

1430.46

6.58

0.20 - 0.5

Moderately Suitable

6882.75

31.65

0.50 - 0.65

Highly Suitable

4242.87

19.51

0.65 - 1.00

Very Highly Suitable

442.08

2.03

21746.52

100.00

TOTAL

Figure 5. Locations of Best Sites for Landfill Site in the Study Area

facility must all be considered in choosing which of the

best sites to develop. Additionally, the selected site
should be evaluated in terms of the land ownership,
land use and availability of utilities (Erkut et al., 1991). If
all these other factors are considered, there would be a
significant reduction in both the cost and time
associated with detailed site investigations (Rafiee et
al., 2011).

CONCLUSIONS
Siting of landfill site is multidisciplinary and a very
complex process, therefore careful consideration of all
factors ranging from environmental to economic is
required. This research has demonstrated the use of
multi-criteria evaluation (MCE) in GIS-Fuzzy Logic
environment for selecting of a landfill site in the
Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis. The MCE was therefore
proven to be an effective and efficient method of siting
a landfill.

Through a thorough consultation with city planners and

experts and based on availability of data, criteria were
selected; attribute were developed for the criteria; the
criteria were standardised and weighted in terms of
their relative importance. The standardisation of the
criteria was based on suitability for landfill site. Using
WLC, the standardised maps were then combined and
several constraints applied on the combined map. The
study demonstrated that fuzzy logic is a straightforward
method that can be implemented easily in a raster GIS
environment. Using fuzzy logic and WLC in the GIS
environment city planners and decision makers are
provided with a reliable and useful tool for decision
making. The results of this study therefore offer
decision makers in the study area variety of options
with which to site a landfill.
The method adopted in this study is very flexible, it
allows inclusion of many criteria based on decisionmakers ideas, the method has great potential for
application in other areas. The method is also
repeatable and understandable in terms of

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment

J. Environ. Waste Manag.

methodology and computations; thus, the process can

be completed for several runs each time, with different
weights, factor and constraint maps.

REFERENCE
Ayat M (2006). The Networks of Collection and
Transfer Stations of Municipal Solid Waste
Management System, pp 1-137: University of Tehran.
Eastman JR (2009). Guide to GIS and Image
Processing, IDRISI Tiga(manual version 16). edn.
Clarke Lab: University of Clarke, Worcester, MA.
Erkut E, Moran SR (1991). Locating obnoxious facilities
in the public sector: An application of the hierarchy
process to municipal landfill siting decisions.
Socioecon. Plann. Sci. 25(2): 8-102.
Fei-Baffoe B, Nyankson AE, Gorkeh-Miah J (2014).
Municipal Solid Waste Management in SekondiTakoradi Metropolis, Ghana. Journal of Waste
Management 2014: 1-9.
Ghana Environmental Protection Agency (GEPA)
(2002). Landfill Guideline, p 73. Accra, Ghana.
Javaheri H, Jafarian MH, Rowshan GR, Khoshnam H
(2006). Site Selection of Municipal Solid Waste
Landfills Using Analytical Hierarchy Process Method
in
A
Geographical
Information
Technology
Environment
in
Giroft.
Iranian
Journal
of
Environmental Health Science and Engineering3(3):
177-184.
Jiang H, Eastman JR (2000). Application of fuzzy
measure in multi-criteria evaluation in GIS.
International Journal Geographical Information
Science 14(2): 173-184.
Karkazi A, T H, Mavropoulos A, Emmanouilidou B,
Ahmed E (2001). Landfill Siting Using GIS and Fuzzy
Logic
Kirkwood CW (1997). Strategic Decision Making:
Multiobjective Decision Analysis with spreadsheets.
edn. Duxbury Press: Belmont, CA.
Kreith F (1994). Handbook of Solid Waste
Management. edn. McGraw-Hill: New York, NY, USA.
Kumi-Baoteng B, Stemn E, Agyapong AE (2015). Effect
of Urban Growth on Urban Thermal Environment: A
Case Study of Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis of Ghana
Journal of Environment and Earth Science 5(2): 3241.
Lin H, Kao J (1999). Enhanced Spatial Model for
Landfill Siting Analysis. Journal of Environmental
Engineering 125(9): 845-851.
Mahamid I, Thawab S (2010). Multi Criteria and Landfill
Site Selection Using GIS: A Case Study from
Palestine. The Open Environmental Engineering
Journal 2010 (3): 33-41.
Makhdum M (1993). Fundamentals of Land Use
Planning. edn. Tehran University Press: Tehran, Iran.
Malczewki J (1999). GIS and Multicriteria Decision
Analysis. edn. John Wiley and Sons, Inc: New York,
NY.
Malczewki J (2004). GIS-based land-use suitability
analysis: A critical overview. Progress Planning 62: 365.

078

Nilchiyan S (2002). Site Selection of Transfer Station

and Collection Centers of Municipal Solid Waste
Management System by Using GIS, pp 1-187:
University of Tehran.
Omrani G, Rezaiee MM, Monvari M, Nasiri P (1998).
Assessment of environmental impact of municipal
solid waste transfer stations in Tehran City. Journal
Environmental Studies 1: 28-39.
Rafiee R (2007). Site Selection for Waste Transfer
Station with Regard to Urban Growth Trend
(Mashhad Case Study), p 105: University of Tehran.
Rafiee R, Nematolah K, Abdolrassoul SM, Ali AD,
Afshin D, Syed EH (2011). Siting Transfer Station for
Municipal Solid Waste Using a Spatial Multi-Criteria
Analysis. Environmental and Engineering Geoscience
17(2): 143-154.
Stemn E, Agyapong E (2014). Assessment of Urban
Expansion in the Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis of
Ghana Using Remote-Sensing and GIS Approach.
International Journal of Science and Technology 3(8):
452-460.
Sekondi Takoradi Metropolis Assembly (STMA).
Western:
Sekondi-Takoradi
Metropolitan.http://www.ghanadistricts.com/districts/?
newsandr=5and_=132. Accessed January 30, 2014.
Tchobanoglous G, Theisen H, Vigil SA (1993).
Integrated Solid Waste Management: Engineering
Principles and Management Issues. edn. McGraw Hil:
New York, USA.
United Stata Environmental Protection Agency
(USEPA) (2004). Waste Transfer Station: A Manual
for
DecisionMaking.http://www.epa.gov/ebtpages/waste.html.
Accessed March 24, 2014.
United Stata Environmental Protection Agency(USEPA)
(2014). Landfill and Combustion. In: The Quest for
Less, pp 165-167: USEPA.
Zadeh LA (1965). Fuzzy Sets, Information and Control.
edn. Faculty Publications: Berkely.
Zeinhom EA, Rasha E, Ahmed E (2009). Integrating
GIS and MCDM to Deal with Landfill Site Selection.
International Journal of Engineering and Technology,
10 (6): 1-11.
Accepted 05 June, 2015.
Citation: Stemn E, Bilintoh TM (2015). Municipal solid
waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi
metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS
environment: Case study. Journal of Environment and
Waste Management 2(2): 071-078.

Copyright: 2015 Stemn and Bilintoh. This is an

open-access article distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits
unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any
medium, provided the original author and source are
cited.

Municipal solid waste landfill site selection in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis of Ghana using fuzzy logic in a GIS environment