Assessing the relationship among waste generation, wealth, and GHG emissions in Switzerland: some policy proposals for the optimization of the municipal solid waste in a circular economy perspective

This study aims to investigate the nexus among waste generation, economic growth, and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in a circular economy framework for the case of Switzerland. Using two different empirical approaches (Dynamic Auto-Regressive Distributed Lags and Fuzzy Cognitive Maps), time-series results show that municipal waste and economic growth have both a short- and a long-run impact on GHG emissions. Moreover, causality analyses evidence the presence of a unidirectional causal flow running from municipal waste and economic growth to greenhouse gas emissions, while a bidirectional causality between municipal waste and economic growth. The results of the static analysis of the municipal solid waste cognitive map show that the most significant system variables relate to the domains of “policy drivers” (education and awareness campaigns and extended producer responsibility) and “environment and health” (GHG emissions). Findings of the policy scenario simulations reveal that the most effective drivers are those about the mission-oriented policy approach.