Characterization of Landfilled Municipal Solid Waste following in Situ Aerobic Bioreduction

In January 1997, a pilot-scale project to assess the feasibility of in silu aerobic bioreduction of municipal solid waste was initiated at the Live Oak Landfill, located near Atlanta, Georgia The high costs (money, regulatory hurdles, societal objections) of developing new landfills are making fccovery and reuse of existing landfill space an increasingly attractive alternative. Onc bf the first exampler of landfill mining in tbe U.S. was the Collier County, FL landfill that began mining operations in 1986 (von Stein and Savage, 1993). The Collier County demonstration did not include aerobic bioreduction before mining. Some benefits of aerobic bioreduction of municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills include: reduced emissions of methane and reduced mctbane recovery costs; extended life of currently operating landfills: potential minimization of leachate and landfill gas contamination of ground water; stabilization and/or complete removal of old. unlined landfills.