Despite recent increases in recycling, composting, and incineration, the sanitary landfill remains the predominant and most economical municipal solid waste (MSW) management alternative. Modern MSW landfills strive to optimize the design, construction, and operation processes in order to mitigate many of the potentially negative impacts, and improve the profitability. The bioreactor landfill (B...

SUMMARY: Landfills containing organic matter pose an environmental risk for many decades. This is also the case for the landfill Heferlbach, which has been filled until 1974 with more than 200,000 tons of waste. Since no liners have been installed at this site, landfill gas generation represents a potential hazard to the surrounding environment. In particular, the risk for methane migration int...

Landfills receiving a mix of waste, including organics, have developed dramatically over the last 3-4 decades; from open dumps to engineered facilities with extensive controls on leachate and gas. The conventional municipal landfill will in most climates produce a highly contaminated leachate and a significant amount of landfill gas. Leachate controls may include bottom liners and leachate coll...

Recently, roofed landfills have been gaining popularity in Japan. Roofed landfills have several advantages over non-roofed landfills such as eliminating the visibility of waste and reducing the spread of offensive odours. This study examined the moisture balance and aeration conditions, which promote waste stabilisation, in a roofed landfill that included organic waste such as food waste. Moist...

Municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills are among the nation’s largest emitters of methane, a key greenhouse gas, and there is considerable interest in quantifying the surficial methane emissions from landfills. There are limitations in obtaining accurate emissions data by field measurements, and in characterizing an entire landfill with only a few such emissions measurements. This paper proposes...

Analyses of air bubbles within ice cores suggest that the concentration of atmospheric methane remained fairly steady from 1500 BC to 1700 AD. However, with the dawn of the Industrial Revolution atmospheric methane concentrations began to increase. Recent findings of Simpson et al. (2006) have shown that the growth in the concentration of tropospheric methane has leveled off based on air sampli...

Leachate accumulation was found in Nakazono landfill, in Asahikawa, Japan because of an insufficient leachate collection and drainage system. In order to lower leachate level in the landfill and to promote stabilization of waste, many passive gas vents were installed as well as leachate collection vaults. This study aimed to evaluate the distribution and movement of leachate in the landfill by ...

Methane emissions from municipal landfills represent 3% of the total United States greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change. These methane emissions can be released to the air or collected and flared. This landfill gas also has the potential to be used to generate electricity. In 1994,the Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) created the Landfill Methane Outreach Program, with ...

The biological conversion of sulfate from disposed gypsum drywall to hydrogen sulfide (H(2)S) in the anaerobic environment of a landfill results in odor problems and possible health concerns at many disposal facilities. To examine the extent and magnitude of such emissions, landfill gas samples from wells, soil vapor samples from the interface of the waste and cover soil, and ambient air sample...