Ontology-based knowledge sharing for waste management domain

Abstract

Effective knowledge management and sharing are required for each domain, and for this purpose, ontologies have been used for many years as a prominent conceptual tool. Like other areas, Waste Management (WM) requires ontology for knowledge management and sharing. This research proposes a domain ontology as a conceptual model that can assist WM departments and other stakeholders in improving knowledge management and sharing. Prior to this research, the development of ontology in the WM domain was focused on capturing and representing the static knowledge or endurants of the domain, with less focus on the dynamic knowledge or perdurants of the domain. Furthermore, WM is the domain of interlocking institutional worlds (IWs) in which modeling of perdurants, is central for modeling the endurants. This research aims to design and develop a domain ontology for WM, namely, OntoWM, for representing the waste collection sub-domain that needs to address both the endurant and the perdurant aspects. Additionally, this ontology can be used as the basis for facilitating Information and Communication Technology (ICT)-based applications. OntoWM domain ontology was designed and developed based on a philosophically grounded upper-level ontology, namely, Unified Foundational Ontology (UFO) and a Design & Engineering Methodology for Organizations (DEMO) methodology, rooted in the concept of IWs and grounded in a Design Science Research Methodology (DSRM). Finally, this study presents an evaluation of OntoWM using a Framework for Evaluation in Design Science (FEDS) with techniques such as evaluation using meta-properties, criteria-based evaluation, application-based evaluation, automated consistency checking using a reasoner, verification using an ontology debugger, verification using an ontology pitfall scanner (Oops), and validation using competency questions (CQs). The evaluation results illustrated that the proposed ontology can be effectively used as a conceptual model to structure and represent both endurant and perdurant aspects, which can be shared among participating organizations.