Blockchain and IoT for Enhanced Traceability in Waste Treatment Processes: A Microservice and Brokerless Approach

The management of medical waste, especially in developing countries, presents substantial challenges that have been further intensified by the Covid-19 pandemic. Traditional waste treatment methods often bypass the crucial step of segregating waste at the source, which results in environmental pollution and health hazards. To tackle these issues, we propose a model that leverages Hyperledger Fabric to establish a transparent, secure, and unalterable record of waste treatment processes, thereby ensuring data integrity, transparency, and traceability. The incorporation of Internet of Things (IoT) devices facilitates real-time data collection and control, thereby further enhancing the traceability of the medical waste treatment process. Our model adopts a microservice architecture, which provides several advantages over traditional approaches, including improved scalability, simplified maintenance and updates, and the flexibility to use different technologies for different services. This research makes a five-fold contribution to the field, namely i) presenting a robust and scalable solution based on the blockchain platform; ii) implementing a proof-of-concept via Hyperledger Fabric; iii) providing an integration of IoT devices for real-time data collection and control; iv) proposing the microservice architecture for medical waste treatment; and v) evaluating the effectiveness of the proposed model via the Round Trip Time and Hyperledger Caliper (i.e., data creation & query) test cases.