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Advances in Research on Sustainable Waste Treatment and Technology
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Advances in Research on Sustainable Waste Treatment and Technology

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Waste and Recycling".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 June 2026 | Viewed by 2864

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Charikleia Prochaska

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Laboratory of Chemical and Environmental Technology, Department of Chemistry, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece
Interests: environmental science and technology; waste and wastewater treatment and management; constructed wetlands; novel materials for environmental applications
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Research focused on sustainable waste treatment and technology is a rapidly evolving field. Advances that ensure both environmental protection and human health while simultaneously being both energy- and cost-efficient require continued innovation and cross-cutting interdisciplinary research. This is important to adapt to the new challenges that need to be faced, particularly with the expansion of artificial intelligence (AI).

This Special Issue aims to gather the latest developments in the field. Topics of interest may include:

  • Innovations in waste treatment and technology
  • Waste collection infrastructure: addressing limitations in current and aging systems
  • Waste disposal and reuse: strategies for sustainable end-of-life waste solutions
  • Energy management, integrating efficient energy use within waste systems
  • AI-driven challenges, including data quality, privacy, and economic viability

The Special Issue intends to collect research and review articles that provide the results of novel approaches and address important gaps in our knowledge. Submissions may deal with problems of practical relevance or focus on an experimental system of any size—large, small, pilot, or lab—and may pertain to developed, developing, or underdeveloped countries.

I look forward to receiving your contributions. 

Dr. Charikleia Prochaska
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • sustainable waste management and treatment
  • energy recovery
  • waste sorting
  • recycling
  • circular economy
  • sustainability
  • artificial intelligence
  • machine learning
  • regulations
  • policy

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Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

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37 pages, 3471 KB  
Article
Sustainable Municipal Solid Waste Treatment in a Central Asian City: A Geographic Information System and Scenario-Based Framework for Technology Prioritization in Shymkent, Kazakhstan
by Akbota Aitimbetova and Zhaksylyk Pernebayev
Sustainability 2026, 18(11), 5318; https://doi.org/10.3390/su18115318 - 25 May 2026
Abstract
Sustainable municipal solid waste (MSW) treatment in rapidly urbanizing secondary cities requires evidence-based, district-level prioritization of technologies. We integrate GIS hotspot mapping, Random Forest, and AnyLogic System Dynamics into a decision-support framework and apply it to Shymkent, Kazakhstan (population 1.19 million; ≈301,400 tonnes [...] Read more.
Sustainable municipal solid waste (MSW) treatment in rapidly urbanizing secondary cities requires evidence-based, district-level prioritization of technologies. We integrate GIS hotspot mapping, Random Forest, and AnyLogic System Dynamics into a decision-support framework and apply it to Shymkent, Kazakhstan (population 1.19 million; ≈301,400 tonnes of MSW in 2025). This is the first application of such a framework to MSW management in a Kazakhstani secondary city and, to our knowledge, the first regional application across Central Asia; the integration concept has prior precedents in Latin American, South Asian, and East Asian metropolitan studies, and the present contribution lies in empirical calibration to a Central Asian upper-middle-income context using 2015–2025 morphological audits, air-quality and soil monitoring, and Sentinel-2 NDVI. Random Forest (n = 80, 9 predictors) achieved R2 = 0.976 ± 0.011 under 5-fold cross-validation; a complementary GroupKFold protocol confirms the model is Shymkent-calibrated while the methodology remains transferable. AnyLogic simulation shows an Infrastructure/Waste-to-Energy pathway reduces the 2030 annual landfilled volume to ≈201 kt, environmental risk by 70%, and methane emissions by 86% (≈270 kt CO2-eq/year) relative to the Inertial baseline. The principal deliverable is a District × Technology × Phase prioritization matrix for sequencing sustainable investment under realistic budget constraints. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Research on Sustainable Waste Treatment and Technology)
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20 pages, 8731 KB  
Article
Connecting with the Past: Filament Development and 3D Printing from Historical Wood Waste
by Aljona Gineiko
Sustainability 2025, 17(21), 9402; https://doi.org/10.3390/su17219402 - 22 Oct 2025
Viewed by 1314
Abstract
Waste prevention is at the top of the EU Waste Framework directive hierarchy. With this in mind, this article considers the application of novel technologies in the Cultural Heritage Restoration and Conservation field through environmental and circular economy principles. While previous research has [...] Read more.
Waste prevention is at the top of the EU Waste Framework directive hierarchy. With this in mind, this article considers the application of novel technologies in the Cultural Heritage Restoration and Conservation field through environmental and circular economy principles. While previous research has explored the use of wood waste for composite materials such as building insulation and concrete additives, the suitability of degraded historical wood waste for filament production and 3D printing has not yet been addressed. This article contributes to this topic by studying the PLA/wood composite, material composed of a polylactic acid (PLA) polymer matrix reinforced with wood particles, produced from degraded historical construction materials. The paper describes the process of producing filament from bio- and moisture-damaged pine beam and oak parquet, followed by the 3D printing of historical platband replica. Research methods include photogrammetry, filament machine construction, filament production and 3D printing. The machines settings used in the process: heater temperatures were set to 140 °C, 90 °C and 105 °C; servo speed was 33 s; spool tension was 12.5; winding speed was 24 RPM; and screw speed was 9.2 RPM. For material preparation, a mixture containing 25% pine and oak sawdust and PLA dust was processed to achieve particle sizes of 312 μm, 471 μm, and 432 μm, respectively. Filament production was carried out with diameters of 2.85 mm for the pine/PLA composite and 1.75 mm for the oak/PLA composite. Finally, replica samples were fabricated using 3D printing. The dual objective of this research was to develop the method of 3D printing from degraded historical materials and introduce it to restoration practice as a wood waste minimization technique. Perspectives for further study include the testing of 3D-printed construction materials in outdoor conditions, and pellet production to achieve a higher wood content, compared to the filament thread. The processes described are adaptable to a variety of materials and disciplines. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Research on Sustainable Waste Treatment and Technology)
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Review

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18 pages, 1086 KB  
Review
Clay-Supported Fe3O4 Magnetic Nanocomposites as Adsorbents for Heavy Metal Removal from Water and Wastewater: A Mini Review on Trends and Future Perspectives
by Charikleia Prochaska, Vasileios Tzitzios and Georgia Basina
Sustainability 2026, 18(4), 1745; https://doi.org/10.3390/su18041745 - 9 Feb 2026
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 805
Abstract
This mini-review presents the major research trends in the synthesis, performance, and mechanisms of clay-supported magnetic iron oxide nanocomposites for the adsorption of heavy metals in water and wastewater treatment applications. The immobilization of iron oxide nanoparticles onto the hydrophilic natural or synthetic [...] Read more.
This mini-review presents the major research trends in the synthesis, performance, and mechanisms of clay-supported magnetic iron oxide nanocomposites for the adsorption of heavy metals in water and wastewater treatment applications. The immobilization of iron oxide nanoparticles onto the hydrophilic natural or synthetic nanoclay matrices not only minimized the magnetic nanoparticles’ tendency to aggregate in aquatic solutions but also facilitated their recovery from the solutions via magnetic separation after adsorption. For these reasons, research on such materials emerged in the early 2010s, leading to the development of highly efficient nanocomposite adsorbents. At optimum conditions, including solution pH values between 5 and 7, rapid equilibrium times ranging from 30 to 180 min, and ambient or moderately elevated temperatures (up to 60 °C), maximum adsorption values of up to 225 mg/g were reported for certain heavy metals. Moreover, the nanocomposites demonstrated reusability, maintaining adsorption performance towards heavy metals for up to five adsorption–desorption cycles when common acids (such as HNO3 and HCl) were used as regenerating agents. However, the current findings are all based on batch-scale laboratory experiments. To move toward industrial-scale applications, further research is necessary to address scale-up challenges and evaluate the performance of the clay-supported magnetic iron oxide nanocomposites under real-world conditions. All the critical limitations are highlighted in the context of this mini review to support future efforts toward achieving their economic and environmentally sustainable application for the adsorption of heavy metals from water/wastewater streams. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Research on Sustainable Waste Treatment and Technology)
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