The Influencing Factors and Forecasting of Municipal Solid Waste Generation—Based on Provincial Clustering Analysis

Municipal solid waste(MSW) is the derivative of urban development. Sustainable waste management and scientific disposal methods have become the focus in academic researches and policy design. Among them,understanding the generation mechanism of municipal solid waste and estimating future trend of MSW are the basis for determining the proper disposal methods. Based on the provincial panel data,this paper has used Chinese residents' consumption structure during 2008-2018 to explore the MSW generation mechanism. Three MSW generation models for these three economic-consumption provincial groups are built. On the basis of local models,this paper has combined the ordinary least square (OLS) and multiple linear regression (MLR) to forecast the MSW generation of provinces in different regions. The conclusions of this paper are as follows:firstly,the consumption structure of residents has a significant impact on the generation of municipal solid waste,among which housing expenditure has a significant negative impact on the MSW generation; secondly,with the increase of MSW infrastructure investment,MSW generation volumes decrease,indicating that effective related investment can improve the current garbage situation; thirdly,Zhejiang,Hunan and Sichuan province will all face severe pressure of urban household waste by 2020 compared with their own development level. Although the total volume of waste faced by some regions is not large at present,due to the great economic development potential,the growth rate of MSW in the future will be fast,such as Sichuan province.