Team name: UVA trash(wo)men
Members: Meg Kitamura, Nora Svensson Hahr, Jesper Brinkhof
Originally this project aimed to shine a light on landfill management across the world using OSINT. This brought us to waste management in the Gaza Strip where we eventually focused on highlighting waste mismanagement of landfills and illegal dumpsites through satellite fire analysis.
In particular, we found that mismanaged landfills and illegal dumpsites frequently catch fire both when compared to their surrounding area and compared to operational and functioning landfills.
The biggest road bump we faced was making sense of the multiple factors contributing to this issue throughout history. This is why we will continue to work on this project (as part of our Open Source Investigations UVA course) to build a comprehensive picture of the waste management situation in the Gaza Strip, including stakeholders, challenges, and solutions.
Some questions for future investigation include:
- Who is responsible for the poor management of legal landfills?
- Why are the landfills mostly stationed along the Israel border?
- Why is there a discrepancy in waste management in South vs North Gaza?
- Who is responsible for the leachate leakage at continued dumping at Juhor Ad-Dik landfill?
- How will the governing body in Gaza solve the landfill crisis?
- What are the environmental impacts of landfill fires in Gaza?
The presentation and mapping of landsites and illegal dumpsites can be found here.
Due to the size of the files, all sources and material used can be found in this Google Drive.