After a seism, sanitation is an issue that requires immediate attention at different levels, with the aim of minimizing the latent risks to the public health. The aim of this study is to develop a methodological framework proposal to analyze the possibility of earthquake waste management, considering technical aspects and legal frameworks after an earthquake in a developing country. The implementation case study, the 2017 Mexico City earthquake, has presented data collection of the types of waste and quantities carried out in the field, as well as from government reports and calculations; furthermore, a study was developed to analyze the capacity installed to earthquake waste management, by means of interviews conducted in the field due to the lack of public and congruent institutional information. Finally, an analysis was conducted of the current legal framework and public policy of disaster waste management. In this sense, earthquake rubble totaled 344,211.3 tons and the estimated weight of households items per collapsed dwelling amounted to 424.16 kg. This manuscript deals with the management of earthquake waste in Mexico, based on the data of the 2017 earthquake; the study also explains possible problems and political challenges about the earthquake waste management with the limited conditions of a developing country.

The environmental and human health impacts of mono-crystalline silicon (mono-Si) module assembly in Mexico were estimated using a regionalized Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). A detailed inventory was completed through fieldwork consisting of arranged visits to four manufacturers to collect on-site data. The main findings demonstrate that, on average, between 10% and 35% of the photovoltaic cells imported from China for module assembly in Mexico are discarded during the manufacturing process. Furthermore, experimental studies conducted in our laboratories with samples collected from the manufacturing plants showed that the busbars and finger contacts on the cells and strings indicate the presence of lead and a lack of silver in the aluminum-based alloys used for soldering and coating the strings. The LCA study includes end-of-life scenarios, with particular attention to open-dump waste disposal, the most common option in Mexico, which generates three-times-greater environmental impacts than waste incineration. The impact of different transport options for importing cells from China yielded Global Warming Potential (GWP) values of 157.52 kg CO₂ eq and a Cumulative Energy Demand (CED) of 2204.9 MJ eq, compared to 8.9 kg CO₂ eq and 123.3 MJ eq, respectively, obtained for sea transport. These results highlight the importance of including transport and end-of-life scenarios to obtain realistic environmental and human health impacts from photovoltaic module manufacturing.