In most large and fast growing urban areas,
finding suitable lands for construction of landfill is one of
the serious problems in environmental management. Land
fill site selection process depends on different factors,
regulations and constraints. Ignoring each of these
parameters may cause miscalculations and lead to selection
of an inappropriate landfill site which could have negative
environmental, economical, and ecological impacts.
Therefore, this process must be accomplished by taking
into account all of the related criterions and variables. In
this study, landfill site selection is performed by combining
geographic information system (GIS) and analytical hierarchy
process (AHP) in Hamedan province, west of Iran. In
relation to landfill site selection, ten different criteria
including Geology, surface water, aquifer, land use, elevation,
slope, and distance to main roads, residential areas,
faults and sinkholes were investigated. Using AHP each
criterion was weighted, then geographic information system
(Arc GIS 9.3 software) was used to manipulate and
present spatial data. Finally, suitability map was prepared
by overlay analyses and most suitable and suitable areas
were identified and checked in field. The results indicate
that 60.4 % of the area in the Hamedan province
(11,631 km2
) is unsuitable, 33 % (6,257.7 km2
) moderately
suitable and 6.6 % (1,344 km2
) most suitable for
construction of landfill.