Towards Sustainable Composting of Source-Separated Biodegradable Municipal Solid Waste—Insights from Long An Province, Vietnam

Abstract

Inadequate municipal solid waste (MSW) management has become a pressing concern, resulting in significant environmental contamination, particularly in developing countries. Composting has demonstrated its practicality and feasibility for addressing this issue; however, the lack of at-source solid waste separation remains a major challenge. As a result, in this study, the first sustainable MSW separation at source was conducted in Tan An City, Long An Province. The objective of this study was to evaluate the compost process and quality using Tan An City’s separated biodegradable organic solid waste as the raw material, through a windrow composting process with active aeration. Biodegradable organic waste, slow-biodegradable organic waste and plastic waste accounted for 84.5%, 15.1% and 0.4%, respectively, of the total waste. The pH, moisture, volatile solid percentage, total nitrogen, total organic carbon and carbon-to-nitrogen ratio of the separated solid waste were 8.7 ± 0.4, 76.8 ± 1.9%, 68.3 ± 1.3%, 2.1 ± 0.1%, 35.7 ± 2.2% and 17 ± 0.8, respectively. Rice straw was mixed with solid waste as a bulking material in a 31%:69% ratio to achieve a moisture content of 55% in the mixture. After 10 weeks, an evaluation of the compost’s quality revealed its potential suitability for agricultural applications. Notably, Salmonella was not detected in the compost, and the heavy metal levels were below standard limits, indicating the safety of the compost. To ensure optimal nutrient levels for effective plant growth, a slight nitrogen and phosphorus supplement was recommended. Aligned with the C/N ratio of 12.1 and a consistent temperature of approximately 29 °C, this indicates a high degree of maturity and stability in the composting process. The framework of this study demonstrates the effectiveness of at-source MSW separation in paving a sustainable path for MSW management.