1 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION 1.0 Background of the study Rapid rate of population growth, urbanization and improved standard of living made over the past years have produced a number of environmental problems especially in our cities. One of such environmental challenges is solid waste management (SWM). The changes in consumption pattern as new resources come into use, have led to increase in the quantity and complexity of solid wastes (SW). Solid waste is any material which comes from domestic, commercial, and industrial sources arising from human activities which has no value to people who possess it and is discarded as useless. In the early days, waste management did not pose difficulty as habitations were sparse and land was plentiful. Waste management became problematic with the rise of towns and cities where large numbers of people started to congregate in relatively small areas in pursuit of livelihoods (Shafiul et al, 2003). Solid waste can also be seen as the unwanted or useless solid materials generated from combined residential, industrial and commercial activities in a given area. It may be categorized according to its origin (domestic, industrial, commercial, construction or institutional); according to its contents (organic material, glass, metal, plastic, paper etc); or according to hazard potential (toxic, non-toxin, flammable, radioactive, infectious etc). American solid waste Act (1963) defines solid waste as garbage, refuse and other discarded materials including all materials resulting from all kind of land uses. The United States Environmental Protection Agency described solid waste as any unwanted or discarded material