Potential for Waste Sector Methane Reduction in Côte d’Ivoire

Introduction

Côte d’Ivoire, through its 2022 Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC), stated the intention of reducing 13.2 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in its energy, waste, and agriculture sectors. This corresponds to a reduction of 10.5% of total national GHG emissions in 2030 compared to the reference scenario. In addition to its NDC, the country a member of the Global Methane Pledge, which aims to reduce anthropogenic methane emissions globally by 2030 by at least 30% below 2020 levels.

Achieving these commitments will require specific strategies and measures to reduce methane emissions from waste sector. Newly available data from satellites can detect and quantify methane emissions from landfills, therefore special attention must be given to ensuring adequate management of the organic fraction of waste and best landfilling practices.

This policy brief characterizes the waste sector’s methane emissions and policy opportunities that contribute to a forward-thinking and sustainable vision to reduce emissions and fulfill the Côte d’Ivoire’s commitments.

Context

Côte d’Ivoire’s 2022 NDC targets identify energy, waste, agriculture, and forestry as priority sectors for reducing GHG emissions by 2030.

In the waste sector, Côte d’Ivoire aims to reduce emissions by 13%, from 6.10 to 5.32 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, with actions mainly focusing on improving waste collection and urban sanitation and ensuring sustainable waste management and recovery.

However, this brief illustrates that the waste sector faces critical challenges that could hinder the timely achievement of commitments to reduce GHG emissions. The analysis and recommendations in this brief are based on insights from case studies in two reference urban settings: Abidjan and Bouaké. The referenced studies were conducted under the Methane Emissions from Landfills in Côte d’Ivoire (MELCI) project, led by a team of researchers from the University Felix Houphouet Boigny and the University Jean Lorougnon Guédé between 2023 and 2024, which was commissioned by the Clean Air Task Force (CATF).

The challenges

1. Significant methane emissions from sanitary landfilling

The Kossihouen Technical Landfill and Valorization Center (CVET) started operating in 2018. It is designed to process up to 1,250,000 tons of waste annually, representing 90% of the waste generated in the Abidjan district, with a total operating lifetime of 47 years. After arriving in trucks, the waste is weighed and buried in impermeable cells in layers covered with a 20 cm thick inert material. The system was designed for landfill gas to be recovered, treated, and flared, as is the leachate, which is reused to irrigate the waste and help accelerate waste decomposition.

Despite Kossihouen CVET’s recent commissioning, the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) satellite instruments have detected significant methane emissions in the site of about 1.4 tons of CH₄ per hour. Additionally, CATF commissioned three satellite observations from GHGSat, a Canadian company recognized as a global leader in satellite methane sensing. Methane emissions were detected in all cases, with an average rate of 2.7 tonnes of CH₄ per hour. To illustrate, these emissions correspond to 23,652 tons of CH₄ per year, which equals the greenhouse gas emissions of 157,618 gasoline-powered passenger vehicles driven for one year.

Methane generation at landfills is influenced by factors such as waste composition, the age and quantity of deposited waste, moisture content, and meteorological conditions. Meanwhile, methane emissions are shaped by operational practices, the type of landfill cover used, the efficiency of landfill gas capture systems, monitoring and quantification methods, and the level of regulatory oversight. Therefore, understanding and evaluating landfills’ dynamic nature and the ongoing generation and emission mechanisms is essential to establishing robust and effective methane reduction measures.

2. Unrecovered Organics

Waste generation per capita in Côte d’Ivoire is about 0.64 kg/person/day, above the average of 0.46 kg/person/day in sub-Saharan Africa. Figure 1 presents results from a waste characterization study conducted in urban and rural areas of Abidjan and Bouaké in 2024, as part of the MELCI project.

Waste composition in Abidjan and Bouaké districts

Organic waste, specifically food and green waste, accounts for over 60% of the total waste (69% in urban areas and 56% in rural areas). At the same time, recyclables, such as plastics, paper, cardboard, glass, and metals, are about 10%. Waste collection and disposal are conducted in a mixed form by pre-collectors and private companies without any formal recovery activity. However, the informal sector is reported to recover recyclables, such as plastic and metals, at waste disposal sites, though details of their recovery network are scarce.

Organic waste is a significant contributor to GHG emissions from landfills globally. Food waste, in particular, is linked with more than 50% of fugitive methane emissions from municipal solid waste landfills. Inadequate organics management also negatively impacts water and soil contamination, the origination of bad odor, infestations, and the loss of valuable organic nutrients. For those reasons, waste minimization is a primary requisite to reduce emissions from organic waste. This is followed by the need to divert organics from being landfilled and instead opt for approaches that capture their resource value.

3. Stakeholders’ coordination and participation

The national and local government agencies follow a delineated institutional and policy structure, including integrating international agreements to which the country is a signatory. In addition, a comprehensive understanding of non-governmental stakeholders’ standing and participation in current decision-making processes is amiss. For instance, while there are no formal records, it has been reported that approximately 3,000 waste pickers and recyclers work in Abidjan (and in the now-closed Akouedo landfill site); at the same time, there is no framework to outline and support the informal sector. Likewise, only limited information on the number and specific areas of interventions from non-governmental organizations (NGOs), is readily available.

Critical waste management stakeholders in Cote d Ivoire

Regarding waste generators’ awareness levels, a questionnaire survey of 1,080 participating households, undertaken by the MELCI project, highlighted media messaging as the key contributor to understanding the waste management-public health nexus. This questionnaire also indicated urban generators with access to private pre-collection showed low interest in separation at source activities, and the main concern for rural waste generators is limited to insufficient waste collection coverage.

Previous experience in lower-income economies has demonstrated that neglecting different stakeholder groups reduces waste system sustainability. Because no single solution is possible and each target area presents different physical, organizational, financial, socio-cultural, and socioeconomic characteristics, selected measures for effective waste management are influenced and affect stakeholders. As such, in the decision-making process, it is required that the stakeholders’ landscape and their interactions be understood and taken into consideration.

Suggested pathways forward

Efforts to reduce emissions from the waste sector require an integrated and comprehensive approach, with the involvement of critical stakeholders. This policy brief makes three key recommendations.

1. Improve the landfill gas management operations

Integrating energy use systems can reduce methane emissions from landfills such as those from Kossihouen CVET, which includes gas capture and flaring. Landfill gas flaring releases carbon dioxide, potentially causing methane emissions due to incomplete combustion and malfunctions if the flare is blown out. Utilizing the captured gas instead will offset carbon dioxide emissions by replacing fossil-based fuels. To do so, it is decisive to work closely with the operator and develop an energy utilization project while establishing a market for the generated energy.

Understanding and conveying the associated financial and environmental risks to all parties is essential in developing landfill gas recovery projects. Of interest is clarifying the generation rate and availability of landfill gas, the collection and recovery technology, and the potential source(s) of revenue. The landfill gas recovery considerations must be harmonious with the city’s strategy for waste collection and potential recovery schemes, including organic diversion programs.

Additionally, in-depth and timely emissions data are required to elucidate the operational hotspots and assess the effects of reduction strategies. A practical approach to fulfilling this requirement combines ground-based direct surveys and satellite remote sensing technology, which can detect, validate, and quantify methane emissions and support landfill monitoring.

2. Harness the organic waste opportunities

Diverting organic waste from landfills and selecting appropriate organic waste management technologies are the best ways to reduce waste sector methane emissions long-term and save limited landfill space for non-recyclable wastes. Implementing an organic diversion program should also be linked to selecting feasible waste collection schemes (e.g., with or without segregation at source) and recycling activities with sustainable and incremental short—to long-term targets.

Several aspects must be considered when selecting management technology, mainly to ensure long-term sustainability, high technical reliability, social acceptance, environmental protection, hygiene, community health protection, and economic sustainability. For instance  composting and anaerobic digestion are biological-based treatments commonly adopted for organic waste and widely acknowledged as suitable for lower-income contexts. Table 1 presents an overview of indicative values covering economics, operations, and environmental aspects for implementing facilities. Other treatment technologies, such as black soldier fly treatment, are becoming more common and provide byproducts such as fly larvae that can be used as a protein in pet and animal food.

Table 1: Potential emissions and costs from composting and anaerobic digestion

Treatment process	GHG emissions (t CO2 eq/ton)	Initial investment (EUR/ton)	Operation costs (EUR/ton)	Annuity (capital cost)*	Revenues (EUR/ton)
Composting	0.51	56.07	88.66	9.12	80.00
Anaerobic Digestion	0.34	98.63	99.30	16.05	88.05

Moreover, robust regulation, financial incentives, infrastructure readiness, and the creation of a processed organics market are critical success factors that decision-makers must carefully account for.

3. Foster stakeholder engagement and collaboration

One critical element in designing and implementing waste management measures is the involvement and ’buy-in’ from all stakeholders (e.g., producers, consumers, service providers, the informal sector, and civil society), including authentic community representation.

As an initial approach, policy- and decision-makers can rely on stakeholder mapping to list and plot the stakeholders and their relationship to the waste management process. In developing specific emission reduction measures, the stakeholder analysis will provide a clarification of the degree of the impact on each stakeholder, the level of interest attached to their needs, the level of influence to support/oppose, and an understanding of the potential role and resources they can bring to the table. For this task, government institutions can collaborate with academia, considering their known potential to be objective knowledge brokers, connectors with other stakeholders, and promoters of science-based activities.

Lastly, regarding public awareness, resources need to be mobilized for environmental awareness campaigns, outreach, and community involvement programs, educating on issues such as waste reduction, separation, and recovery and capitalizing on the acknowledged influence that media channels currently have.