Keywords: environmental audit, waste management, action plan, dangerous waste, urban waste

Abstract

The study focuses on conducting an environmental audit that will contribute to the improvement of environmental practices in the solid waste collection service offered by the mayor of Granada city, diagnosing the entire process of collection, treatment and final disposal of the non-hazardous solid waste generated, which will allow to implement an action plan and strengthen the management of solid waste, through a follow-up guide to actions to comply with environmental improvement and an objective evaluation of the elements of the collection, treatment and final disposition of them to minimize the risks of environmental contamination due to the realization of activities that by their nature constitute a potential risk to the environment.

Introduction

One of the main factors that influence the success of a tourist place is the cleanliness of the site. The natural, cultural or historical elements that are a main part of the tourist attractions, can be diminished or disadvantaged when situations of carelessness or lack of cleanliness occur, which can even put at risk the health of the visitors and inhabitants of the place.

From the above, the importance of conducting an environmental audit in the management of solid waste in the city of Granada arose; for which a diagnosis was made, in order to know the current status of processing, handling and the ability to protect the environment and public health. This helped to propose necessary and adequate actions for the management of solid waste, which on the one hand ensure cleaning efficiency and on the other hand do not interfere with the day-to-day activities of the city.

Materials and methods

For the execution of the environmental audit, three general stages were carried out which in turn were divided into sub stages. The main stages were:

1. Stage: Data Collection and Systematization

This stage consisted of the gathering of information regarding the management of solid waste in the city based on the indicators: Generation, Separation, Storage, Collection, Transportation, Sweeping and Final Disposal.

The information was collected in three sub stages:

a. Collection of Primary Information

For the primary compilation, interviews were carried out with the actors involved, such as: Director of Municipal Services, Epidemiologist of the Japan-Nicaragua Hospital, Watchman of the transfer post “El Plantelito” and Watchman of the “La Joya” landfill. In the interviews, questionnaires with open and closed questions were used.

b. Secondary Information Review

The review of secondary information involved the search and bibliographic compilation of the aforementioned research.

c. Verification in situ

In this sub-stage, the audit team made visits to the different locations where waste generation is involved, such as: hospital, transfer posts, market, beach, parks, public squares, tourism sector, landfills, neighborhoods and wastewater channels.

2. Stage: Identification and Discussion of Findings

With the information obtained as a result of stage I, an analysis of it was carried out and as a consequence the identification of findings for further discussion by the audit team.

3. Stage: Preparation of Final Report

As a result of Stage II, a final report was prepared to propose possible recommendations that lead to improved management of non-hazardous solid waste.

Results and Discussion

Integral Management of Solid Waste

For the analysis of solid waste management in the city of Granada, the two types of service were analyzed: ordinary or regular cleaning, extraordinary cleaning service or special service, in addition to the management of “La Joya” landfill in the city.

Ordinary or regular cleaning

Municipal market

At present, the market is made up of a land area of 11,700 m2 and the built area of 9,192 m2, it has 1850 formal merchants and 480 informal merchants, the latter vary depending on the time of the year, approximately 2,000 people pass throughout the market and its surroundings daily.

The market management has its own waste collector staff, which are divided into 7 zones: Patio 1 and 2, Fish, Clothing and footwear, Commerce, Paises bajos, Campana and Mombacho.

On the outskirts of the municipal market there is a solid waste transfer post called “El Plantelito”, which has an area of 746 m2, which receives the solid waste collected from the market cleaning and the streets near it. According to the site’s records, 7.8 tons of solid waste were received a week five years ago and currently, there are more than eight tons.

The frequency of waste transfer to the La Joya landfill is twice a day (7:15 am and 4:00 pm). During the collection of the waste at the transfer post the assistants of the waste collection trucks carry out the separation and classification of the waste, in order to sell it later and distribute the profits among the workers of the truck, it is a way to get more economic support for themselves.

“El Plantelito” has the necessary infrastructure conditions such as: access gate, perimeter wall, cobbled access, hygienic services, electricity and drinking water; In addition to functioning as a transfer post, it also functions as a storage warehouse for garbage collector trucks and structural maintenance materials of the market building.

Japan-Nicaragua Hospital

In the hospital there are two types of solid waste that are classified as dangerous or biological infectious and non-hazardous or common. The management of these is in charge of an epidemiologist at the Hospital.

The waste that is generated by the users, workers, cafeterias and kitchen of the hospital are: papers, plastic bottles, bags and fruit peels. This waste is collected twice a day in the different garbage dumps located in the Hospital and taken to the storage area, being in this place they are placed in containers waiting for the city waste truck to collect them.

House to House Collection

House-to-house collection is currently covering 100% of the urban area (97941 inhabitants). From May 2015, the collection was extended to the rural area with 50% coverage and with a frequency of one day a week. Waste collection in rural areas is in: Posintepe, El Pochote, El Fortín, El Hormigón, Tepeyac and El Mamón, La Prusia, Kauloa, El Guayabo, Los Cocos, Osagay, Camino Real and El Paso.

The information obtained by municipal services of Granada indicates that the population payment for this service is low because it barely covers 20.57% of the total expenses of the garbage collection service, the level of subsidy to the population provided by the municipality reaches 80%. So solving this problem is crucial to curb the economic expense of investing in an activity that can sustain itself.

On the other hand, within the home system, the service for the collection of waste produced by supermarkets: La Colonia, La Unión and dos Pali is also provided. Companies such as: Chamorro, Ceguel, Free Zones, among others; they themselves are responsible for transporting their waste to the landfill, where there is a supervisor of the municipal services form the City Hall whose function is to keep track of how many times companies arrive to deposit garbage, according to this record they are charged to the company for the final disposal service of waste.

It is important to mention that the supervisor only keeps track of the entrances and exits but does not have a record of the physical or chemical classification of the waste that companies leave.

Street Sweeping

Street sweeping is prioritized primarily for the central or tourist area with two shifts from 6:00 am to 12:00 md and 12:00 md to 6:00 pm, street sweeping coverage is 93% in relation to the streets covered (pavement and cobblestone), this because citizens take the commitment to clean their streets as they benefit from the program “Streets for the People” (cobblestone) of their access roads to their homes. In 2016, the street sweeping service was expanded from 600 to 828 blocks / day (23 km extension).

Extraordinary cleaning service or special service

Channel and Drainage Cleaning

The cleaning strategy is perform it before winter with a coverage of 17 km of the main channels that run through the city; After this day it has a maintenance plan for the critical points, this is carried out depending on the frequencies and ravages of the rains. This activity is carried out with 19 workers and a supervisor.

In addition, along with the cleaning of channels, maintenance of 360 drainages and rainwater manholes is performed. It should be mentioned that in the last three years more than 250 metal grills and / or concrete slabs have been installed.

Beach Plan

The Mayor’s Office is responsible for cleaning the access roads to the Tourist Center, the small illegal dumps generated by the sale of coconuts and other food, and the 400 m of the lake coast in front of the Blue Park to where the boardwalk ends.

Holidays

Granada is a participant of great festivities with national and international activities such as: The international poetry festival, the traditional processions of Holy Week, Agostine Festivities, Celebration of La Purísima, among others.

The strategy taken for these eventualities is the immediate cleaning of the place after the event, the number of staff available for these occasions depends on the area covered by the festivities, but on average there are three to ten street sweepers.

At present, the only industrial sector that the municipality provides the garbage collection service is to the textile zones located in the perimeter of the city, the waste from the Textile Zone is included in the route from house to house; payment for the service is depending on the amount of trips requested.

Garbage Increase Analysis

Municipal services works with projections of a study carried out in 1997, by the Japanese Agency for International Cooperation (JAIC), in which they establish that the annual increase in urban solid waste is 1% as can be seen in Table 1.

Table 1. Increase in the per capita rate of solid waste generation

Source: Municipal Services; Report “Achievements and Difficulties 2015”.

For the above, in 2015 a pilot sampling of the amount of waste generated in the household collection was carried out, which generated a result of 0.874 kg/inhabitant/day; This was achieved with the financial support of the Funds for Research Projects (FRP) of UNAN-Managua.

Action plan

The City’s Solid Waste Management Program was designed to benefit the municipality. For its proper execution, the joint action of the different social sectors, both private and public, is required, with the Mayor being the coordinating body of it.

The actions of the Management Plan can be classified according to the planning period in short-term actions: from 0 to 3 years (2017-2019), medium term: from 3 to 5 years (2020-2023), long term: from 6 to 10 years (2024-2027).

The deadlines were chosen according to the priority of action and the possible economic amount that they have to have for their execution. The short-term actions correspond to the implementation activities of the plan, which are of vital importance as the starting point and basis for medium and long-term actions.

Table 2. Strengthening Institutional Management.

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Table 3. Strengthening the Legal Framework

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Table 4. Economic Strengthening

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Table 5. Training and Technical Assistance

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Table 6. Environmental Education and Citizen Participation

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Conclusions

The results of the analysis of solid waste management, indicates that the municipality of Granada has been improved in the management of solid waste, its streets, squares and parks are clean; but the municipality does not have the development of studies, work proposals to reactivate and promote the development of the integral management of solid waste.

There is political will for the application of the Solid Waste Management Program but there is a lack of better articulation in local government and civil society, it is also necessary to improve the levels of environmental awareness through environmental education for the management of solid waste.

The public cleaning service has problems to achieve optimal coverage, due to financing factors. What can be seen is the existence of human capabilities, both at the level of the Municipality and in the community that being empowered can improve the situation.

Aknowledgement

I thank the Fund for Research Projects (FPI), of UNAN-Managua for the financial support for conducting this research.

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