Decision making for urban solid waste treatment in the context of territorial conflict: Can the Analytic Network Process help?

This paper reflects on the potential of the MCDA to help Decision Makers with particular reference to the involvement of the stakeholders, which face and disclose all the elements stopping or affecting the choice. The case study presented concerns the current debate about the best choice for the treatment of municipal solid waste in the Aosta Valley region, a small independent region in the North-West Italy. The Analytic Network Process is applied in order to rank three alternative technologies for waste treatment (namely mechanical biological treatment, incineration - direct combustion - and gasification) and to identify the priority ranking between the elements under examination (namely environmental, social, economic and technological aspects).