Sustainability and Integrated Energy Recovery Scheme for Health Care Waste Management for Megacity Dhaka: Through Material Flow and Life Cycle Assessment.
4 affiliations
- 1Department of Chemical Engineering Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology Dhaka Bangladesh.
- 2Department of Dyes and Chemical Engineering Bangladesh University of Textiles Dhaka Bangladesh.
- 3Department of Chemical Engineering Dhaka University of Engineering and Technology Gazipur Bangladesh.
- 4Department of Civil Engineering United International University (UIU) Dhaka Bangladesh.
Abstract
A sustainable healthcare waste (HCW) management strategy for Dhaka integrating material flow analysis and comparative life cycle assessment is proposed. The current scenario (SC1), heavily reliant on landfilling, low recycling, and incineration without energy integration, is compared with the proposed alternative scenario (SC2), with higher material recycling, waste-to-energy conversion, and heat integration. Using gate-to-grave life-cycle assessment across eighteen ReCiPe 2016 midpoint (H) impact categories, the proposed SC2 outperforms SC1 in ten categories, notably acidification potential by 96%, land-use potential by 97%, climate change impacts by 78%, and marine eutrophication by 44%, while PM formation potential falls by 20.499 kg PM2.5-eq and energy resource depletion becomes a net credit through 20572 kWh/day of recovered electricity. However, trade-offs are observed in the toxicity, eutrophication, and photochemical oxidant formation categories, notably carcinogenic human toxicity (∼3.8x increase), marine ecotoxicity (∼2.3x increase), freshwater eutrophication (∼97% increase), and photochemical oxidant formation potential (∼3x increase). The proposed scheme also supports Bangladesh's drive toward SDG 7 and 13 outright, and toward SDG 3, 6, 11, and 14 once the toxicity and oxidant formation burdens are controlled. Our findings can provide a substantial quantitative framework for improving existing systems to achieve sustainability with a circular economy strategy.
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BibTeX
@article{sajid2026sustainability,
title = {{Sustainability and Integrated Energy Recovery Scheme for Health Care Waste Management for Megacity Dhaka: Through Material Flow and Life Cycle Assessment.}},
author = {Mahmudul Hasan Sajid and S M Akimus Salehin and Musfekur Rahman Dihan and Rayhan Bin Masud and Rumana Afrin and Md Shahinoor Islam and Md Mujibur Rahman},
journal = {Global challenges (Hoboken, NJ)},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1002/gch2.70172},
url = {https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42968897},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Sustainability and Integrated Energy Recovery Scheme for Health Care Waste Management for Megacity Dhaka: Through Material Flow and Life Cycle Assessment.
AU - Mahmudul Hasan Sajid
AU - S M Akimus Salehin
AU - Musfekur Rahman Dihan
AU - Rayhan Bin Masud
AU - Rumana Afrin
AU - Md Shahinoor Islam
AU - Md Mujibur Rahman
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/31
JO - Global challenges (Hoboken, NJ)
DO - 10.1002/gch2.70172
UR - https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42968897
AB - A sustainable healthcare waste (HCW) management strategy for Dhaka integrating material flow analysis and comparative life cycle assessment is proposed. The current scenario (SC1), heavily reliant on landfilling, low recycling, and incineration without energy integration, is compared with the proposed alternative scenario (SC2), with higher material recycling, waste-to-energy conversion, and heat integration. Using gate-to-grave life-cycle assessment across eighteen ReCiPe 2016 midpoint (H) impact categories, the proposed SC2 outperforms SC1 in ten categories, notably acidification potential by 96%, land-use potential by 97%, climate change impacts by 78%, and marine eutrophication by 44%, while PM formation potential falls by 20.499 kg PM2.5-eq and energy resource depletion becomes a net credit through 20572 kWh/day of recovered electricity. However, trade-offs are observed in the toxicity, eutrophication, and photochemical oxidant formation categories, notably carcinogenic human toxicity (∼3.8x increase), marine ecotoxicity (∼2.3x increase), freshwater eutrophication (∼97% increase), and photochemical oxidant formation potential (∼3x increase). The proposed scheme also supports Bangladesh's drive toward SDG 7 and 13 outright, and toward SDG 3, 6, 11, and 14 once the toxicity and oxidant formation burdens are controlled. Our findings can provide a substantial quantitative framework for improving existing systems to achieve sustainability with a circular economy strategy.
SN - 2056-6646
ER -