Study on Waste Composition at Taman Pura Kencana, Batu Pahat

Department of Water and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, 86400, Parit Raja, Batu Pahat, Johor, Malaysia

^* Corresponding author: aeslina@uthm.edu.my

Abstract

Municipal solid waste management is a major challenge due to the increase in population and the development of a country. The problems also arise when the lifespan of the landfills available are shorten than estimated. The aim of this study is to determine waste composition at Taman Pura Kencana. The waste collection was carried out for 50 houses on a daily basis. The collection and sorting out method was conducted based on Malaysian Standard MS 2505:2012 and the data collected is recorded. The result showed the moisture content was approximately ranging between 25% – 30%. The density for each waste has been calculated and the result was recorded accordingly. The highest density is metal followed by organic waste, glass, napkins, household hazardous waste, textiles, paper, plastic rigid, plastic film, rubber and tetrapek. The waste collected also were categorized and consisted of food waste/organic (43.75%), paper (17.97%), plastics rigid (13.58%), plastic film (10.62%), napkins (4.43%), glass (3.10%), household hazardous waste (1.68%), metal (1.67%), tetrapek (1.34%) , rubber (0.93%), and textiles (0.92%). Results from the analysis illustrated that waste generation in Taman Pura Kencana may influenced by sudden changes in lifestyles, incomes, household size and also increase of population.