landfill siting for municipal waste: a case study in ardebil

Landfilling has been recognized as the cheapest method for the disposal of municipal solid waste and as such has been the most used method in iran. landfill site selection is a complex process involving social, environmental, and economical parameters as well as government regulations. the aim of this study is to propose suitable sites for burial municipal waste in the ardebil using multi criteria decision making (mcdm) method, field investigations and environmental study. in the first stage, restriction areas are identified and eliminated using integration geographic information system (gis) and analytical hierarchical process (ahp). then other criteria categorized and weighted using ahp method. by overlapping all of criteria maps 12 sites are recognized as landfill prone areas. in the second stage, eight sites were eliminated during the site investigations study and remining 4 sites were introduced as suitable sites. finally site no. 6 is proposed as the most appropriate site based on the environmental and social-economical considerations were carefully evaluated with technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (topsis) method.