Incorrect disposal of household hazardous waste. A comparison across socio-economically differentiated areas in Gothenburg

Abstract

One essential part when creating sustainable cities is having a functioning waste management system. In Sweden, the household waste system relies on residents to dispose of their waste correctly. A common problem is that hazardous waste is discarded in the residual waste, which is particularly evident in Gothenburg where 6% of households incorrectly dispose of hazardous waste compared to the national average of 1%. There is a lack of research on household hazardous waste, in particular sorting errors of household hazardous waste and its connection to socio-economic and demographic factors from a spatial context. This master’s thesis brings contributions to these research gaps. The aim of this thesis is twofold: first, to analyze whether households’ disposal methods and missorting of household hazardous waste varies across socio-economical differentiated areas in Gothenburg. Second, to identify underlying factors for missorting hazardous waste and investigate potential measures to supporting correct disposal of hazardous waste. The study’s theoretical framework consists of the concepts accessibility, determinants of pro-environmental behavior and segregation. The method is an online questionnaire survey distributed in numerous Facebook groups to collect peoples’ hazardous waste practices. The survey results were analyzed with descriptive statistics, chi-square tests, and binary logistic regressions. Results showed that 50% of the respondents have at least once missorted hazardous waste. Three explanatory factors for the missorting of hazardous waste were found to be statistically significant: size of dwelling, number of people per household, and having property close collection of hazardous waste. The study could not statistically confirm nor identify clear patterns indicating that differences in disposal methods, missorting of hazardous waste, and measures to support proper disposal are due to respondents living in socio-economically differentiated areas. Overall, there is a need for further research on the topic of household hazardous waste, and particularly the missorting of hazardous waste. Two recommendations for further studies are to investigate the missorting of hazardous waste in relation to mobility and time geography.