Análise Comparativa de Custos entre Aterros Sanitários Individuais e Transbordo para Aterros Regionalizados: Um Estudo Aplicado no Estado do Tocantins

Abstract

The inadequate management of municipal solid waste represents one of the primary environmental and fiscal challenges for municipal public administrations in the State of Tocantins, Brazil. This study examines the economic efficiency of different final disposal strategies, contrasting the implementation and operation of small-scale individual sanitary landfills with transfer station systems and transport to licensed regional hubs. The research is characterized as a multiple case study with a quantitative approach, grounded in a situational analysis of 139 Tocantins municipalities from an economic engineering perspective. The methodology comprises a diagnostic of the current final disposal scenario, which reveals that approximately 80% of the municipalities still utilize open dumps, alongside statistical modeling of waste generation and estimation of investment and operating costs adjusted by scale factors. The study delineates three areas of influence organized around the regional landfills of Araguaína, Gurupi, and Porto Nacional. The results demonstrate that a regionalized arrangement using shared transfer stations reduces the total monthly cost from BRL 6,912,819.03 to BRL 3,650,672.55, resulting in a 47.19% saving. The research identifies that the transfer system represents the lowest-cost alternative in 96.2% of the cases analyzed. Additionally, the study demonstrates that, in municipalities with up to 5,000 inhabitants, maintaining an individual landfill costs, on average, 3.15 times more than the regionalized arrangement. The research concludes that the regionalization of waste management services is the most effective strategy to ensure environmental compliance and the budgetary sustainability of the municipalities.