University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Predictive modeling of solid waste generation for aggregate building and material types across geographical contexts

Rice, Abigail Marie

Content Files
RICE-THESIS-2023.pdf

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/120154

Description

Title
Predictive modeling of solid waste generation for aggregate building and material types across geographical contexts
Author(s)
Rice, Abigail Marie
Issue Date
2023-05-02
Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)
Davidson, Paul C
Department of Study
Engineering Administration
Discipline
Agricultural & Biological Engr
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
M.S.
Degree Level
Thesis
Keyword(s)
  • waste
  • predict
  • model
  • resilience
  • generation
  • reduction
  • diversion
Abstract
Solid waste generation is increasing at alarming rates, globally. Challenges to decreasing solid waste generation and landfill disposal are widespread, and U.S. Army installations are a unique basis for providing qualitative and quantitative data from a breadth of geographical locations. The purpose of this study was to assess the modeling prediction capability of solid waste streams from data of 12 Army installations at the aggregate material and building type level. Solid waste generation data was collected by quantifying materials found that have potential for diversion (e.g., source reduction, ruse, recycling, composting, etc.) and are currently being sent to landfill. In coordination with key personnel, buildings were selected that were representative of the main activities conducted at each of the installations. These buildings represent 28 different building categories as defined by the System Master Planning classification tool. Over the period of one week, 100-pound random samples from dumpsters at selected buildings were obtained for each installation studied. Materials were manually separated into 22 categories, weighed, and recorded. Results from the study identified considerable amounts of materials with value and diversion potential in the solid waste stream. A total of three building types and five material types were down selected for model construction and validation based on robustness of data available and applicability outside military contexts. Models were constructed for each material and building type combination to avoid error with multiplication factors of coefficients for each independent variable. Results showed statistical significance (p-value = 0.05) for 12 of 15 modeling combination predictions, indicating that these 12 models for each material and building type are uniquely capable of predicting solid waste generation. P-values for the 12 significant models ranged from 6.94e-07 to 0.033. Each of the 12 statistically significant models differed in R-squared and adjusted R-squared values, ranging from 0.823 to 0.997 and 0.764 to 0.996, respectively. This study provides a unique data source demonstrating the ability to use predictive modeling to forecast solid waste generation at the aggregate building and material type level. Using Army installations as a case study may increase data available across the continental U.S. to focus targeted source reduction efforts.
Graduation Semester
2023-05
Type of Resource
Thesis
Handle URL
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/120154
Copyright and License Information
Copyright 2023 Abigail Rice

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