Capacitated Arc Routing Problem: Collection of Solid Waste at Kwadaso Estate, Kumasi

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2012-06-20
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Abstract
Solid waste management in most cities in Africa has become more challenging in which Ghana is not an exception. This is as a result of industrialization and urban migration, it has therefore become necessary to formulate a model which can be used by city authorities, Governments and waste management groups alike to use a minimal distance to collect more waste in an area. It is upon this basis why this work was done to come out with a solution that can be used to minimize the tour in a collection area and also give some sort of flow chart for the collection. In this study, we selected an area in Kumasi called Kwadaso estates which have 157 collection points and 588 240 litre bins. We first, found all pair shortest path and partitioned the entire collection points into smaller clusters based on the capacity of the vehicle and then used Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) to find the minimum tour in each cluster, which will also serve as a flow chart to guide collection in a cluster. Our study has improved the total distance by about 40% as compelled to the existing figures given by the waste management group in the area (Zoom Lion Ghana Limited).
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A thesis submitted to the School of Graduate Studies, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the Degree of Master of Philosophy in Applied Mathematics.
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