Smart Management of Waste from Construction Sites: Mobile Application Technology in the City Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5821/ctv.8426

Keywords:

sustainable construction, smart waste disposal, startup company of waste

Abstract

This study was carried out in the city of Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil, a municipality surrounded by the Amazon Rainforest. This world heritage site, with a great diversity of fauna and flora, requires the care and attention of both the authorities and the population. The research involved studies on four construction sites to collect data regarding the waste generated and the environmental management practices, especially regarding waste disposal, considering that this item causes major environmental impacts in the Amazon Forest surrounding the city of Manaus. There is only one public landfill, managed by the Municipality of Manaus, and several clandestine landfills, which end up being the final disposal of many construction waste due to lack of inspection and population neglect. The consequences are serious for the Amazon rainforest that suffers the impact of the pollution generated by these residues, such as plastic, paper, metal, and debris which is a major contaminant since it may contain paints, solvents, oils and other materials toxic to nature. Two of the construction sites under study were residential buildings and the other two were thermoelectric power plants (industrial). After data collection through interviews, statistical studies were carried out to analyze and discuss the results obtained, aiming to make the characterization of the current production of construction waste in the city of Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil, and understand how these wastes affect the environment of the Amazon Forest. The collected data enabled the identification of the types of construction waste produced, their respective volumes, and their environmental management practices regarding reuse, sale or disposal. After analyzing the results, it was concluded that the sampled construction companies do not reuse nor recycle construction waste, and discard them in municipal or clandestine landfills. To minimize the identified problem regarding the disposal of construction waste in the city of Manaus, a proposal for the environmental management of construction site waste was developed through mobile application technology, with the aim of mitigating the environmental impacts of these wastes in nature. The mobile application serves as a tool for environmental managers in construction sites, and even for citizens who want to make a renovation in their home and do not know how to allocate the generated construction waste in a responsible and sustainable way. The mobile application was developed on the Android platform and had as premises the main construction waste identified in the construction companies studied in the city of Manaus, which would be plastic, paper, metals, rubble, and demolition remains, such as broken bricks, broken tiles, damaged wood, coatings, paints, mortar and other debris, with potential for contamination and pollution of the environment. The structure of the computer program was developed in order to enable the purchase, sale, exchange, recycling or donation of construction waste through the mobile application itself, which can be acquired for free at the virtual stores. The application was tested by construction professionals, interested in the allocation of small or large amounts of construction waste in safe and legalized sites, controlled either by the municipal or federal government. The application was also presented to and tested by waste disposal companies and urban citizens, to verify the efficiency of the application in the intelligent management of construction waste. Although the application is still in the test phase and not yet commercially available, the results obtained so far demonstrate a higher degree of acceptability and user satisfaction. The results showed widespread interest in the mobile app among urban citizens, construction professionals and waste collection companies, although these latter reveal some concern regarding possible increased monitorization and fiscalization associated with a wider use of the mobile application in the urban area of the city Manaus.

Author Biographies

Maria do Perpétuo Socorro Lamego Oliveira, University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), Praça 9 de Abril 349, 4249-004 Porto, Portugal

Maria do Perpétuo Socorro Lamego Oliveira holds a degree in civil engineering from the Federal University of Amazonas, Brazil. Work Safety Engineer at the Lutheran University of Brazil. MBA in Planning and Management of Works by the University Center Nilton Lins, Brazil. Specialist in Expertise and Evaluations by IPOG, Brazil. Master in production engineering from the Federal University of Amazonas, Brazil. PhD student in Ecology and Environmental Health at Fernando Pessoa University, Porto, Portugal.

Evailton Arantes de Oliveira, University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), Praça 9 de Abril 349, 4249-004 Porto, Portugal

Evailton Arantes de Oliveira holds a degree in civil engineering from the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil. MBA in Planning and Management of Works by the University Center Nilton Lins, Brazil. Master in Civil Engineering in the area of materials and constructive devices by the Federal University of Amazonas, Brazil. Professor of Post-Graduation at Fametro University, Brazil. PhD student at Fernando Pessoa University, Porto, Portugal.

Adriano de Abreu Wanderley, Uninorte Laureat International University, Manaus, Brazil, Rua Joaquim Nabuco, 1270, centro, 69020-030

Adriano Wanderley has a degree in civil engineering from Uninorte Laureat International University and acts as a team leader and managing projects using the SCRUM framework and systems documentation applying UML standards, process diagrams based on BPMN and bank modeling with WorkBench / pgModeler. He also works as a developer with HTML, CSS (Bootstrap), PHP, JQUERY, ARDUINO and PYTHON, using MySQL and PostgreSQL databases.

Arlene Maria Lamego da Silva Campos, Federal Institute of Educ., Science and Technology of Amazonas, Av. 7 setembro 1975, 69020-120 Manaus, Brazil

Arlene Maria Lamego da Silva Campos has a degree in CIVIL ENGINEERING from UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO AMZONAS (1992). Master in Civil Engineering from UFAM (2008), with a concentration in the area of materials. She is currently an engineer at DNIT-Superintendência do Amazonas and Professor at the Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology-IFAM. Has experience in the area of Transport Engineering, with emphasis on PAVIMENTAÇÃO RODOVIÁRIA.

Ana Margarida Fonseca, University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), UFP Energy, Environment and Health Research Unit (FP-ENAS), University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), Praça 9 de Abril 349, 4249-004 Porto, Portugal

A hard tackle from Ana Margarida Araújo to Barros Fonseca. He is Associate Professor at the Fernando Pessoa University. He has published 12 articles in specialized magazines and 11 papers in events proceedings. It has 6 items of technical production. He has participated in 10 events in Portugal. Acting in the area of Environmental Engineering In his professional activities he interacted with 19 collaborators in co-authorship of scientific works.

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Published

2020-04-28