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Landfill life and the many lives of landfills
Published in Zsuzsa Gille, Josh Lepawsky, The Routledge Handbook of Waste Studies, 2021
The old argument that landfills might improve waste-land is clearly no longer valid—if ever it was—given the mixed materials, including large volumes of plastic, that everyday waste streams are composed of these days. Landfilling has been portrayed as almost criminally wasteful, and has been penalized through fiscal measures such as the EU landfill tax. Alternatives to landfill include the reduction of waste generated, re-use, recycling, anaerobic digestion (AD), and waste-to-energy technologies. While many aspire to reduce waste at an individual level, moves in the direction of a more circular economy have been slow. Despite vociferous anti-plastic campaigns, for instance, global plastic waste generation is still expected to grow by at least 50% over the next 20 years (Lebreton and Andrady 2019). Recycling is dependent on there being a local market for materials, which have to compete with virgin resources and whose recovery is often costly and requires subsidy (MacBride 2011). Local re-use movements might be laudable, but they are yet to make much of an impact on reducing global waste flows. AD is increasingly popular but can only deal with organic waste. This leaves Waste-to-Energy plants as the only competing technique that can accept most waste, as landfills do, but with the benefit of being able to produce electricity. The 20th-century struggle between landfill and incineration is set to be replayed in the 21st, with each method boasting of improvements in technique, capacity, contamination control, and cost.
Municipal Waste Management
Published in Mary K. Theodore, Louis Theodore, Introduction to Environmental Management, 2021
Mary K. Theodore, Louis Theodore
Generally, landfill owners/operators must install monitoring systems to detect groundwater contamination. Sampling and analysis must be conducted twice a year. States and tribes with EPA-approved programs have the flexibility to tailor facility requirements to specific local conditions. For example, they may specify different frequencies for sampling groundwater for contaminants or phase in the deadline for complying with the federal groundwater monitoring requirements.
External Components of the Financial Analysis
Published in Gene Beck, Grid Parity, 2020
LEEDTM certification provides independent, third-party verification that a building project meets the highest green building and performance measures. There are both environmental and financial benefits to earning LEEDTM certification. LEED-certified buildings: Lower operating costs and increased asset value.Reduce waste sent to landfills.Conserve energy and water.Are healthier and safer for occupants.Reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions.Qualify for tax rebates, zoning allowances and other incentives in hundreds of cities.Demonstrate an owner’s commitment to environmental stewardship and social responsibility.
Pricing problem in a medical waste supply chain under environmental investment: a game theory approach
Published in Journal of Industrial and Production Engineering, 2022
Reza Maihami, Iman Ghalehkhondabi
A healthcare facility can provide medical treatment on-site or off-site. In any case, non-hazardous waste and treated hazardous waste, such as ash from an autoclave or incinerator, are disposed of in a landfill. Figure 1 shows several common strategies for managing hazardous medical wastes. Strategy 1 includes three independent firms that handle the hazardous waste to the landfill for the final disposal. It is the most common method. Hospital waste is collected and transported to the appropriate treatment facility (or DF) by a third-party company referred to as the transfer station (or contractor). The treatment firm will take suitable disposal technology and converts waste to acceptable products by a landfill. In the final step, the treated waste is moved from the treatment facility to the landfill by either the treatment company or landfill company. In strategy 2, the healthcare facility owns both the transfer station and the treatment facility. This strategy is rare due to its high capital costs and control complexity. Strategy 3 is more common than strategy 2, in which the healthcare facility only owns the transfer station. The hospital’s in-house fleet collects and transports hazardous waste to the treatment facility. In strategy 4, the transfer station and treatment facility are run by the same company (either the treatment facility or the transfer station). This strategy is mostly used in the U.S. Strategies 2, and 4 could be called “Corporation” strategies, whereby all operations are handled by one company.
Cost-benefit analysis of rehabilitating old landfills: A case of Beiyangqiao landfill, Wuhan, China
Published in Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association, 2020
Aidana Ospanbayeva, Songlin Wang
Landfill ecosystems are semi-natural terrestrial ecosystems that are formed on the lands used for disposal of solid waste. They are unique in terms of site formation, nature of stratum, and biological activities, and vary according to their age, waste composition, engineering design, and ecological practice. From an environmental perspective, landfills are depositories for municipal solid wastes (sanitary landfills) and hazardous wastes (secure landfills). Modern landfills are designed and constructed to restrict the formation and movement of landfill leachate and gas, and to minimize environmental nuisance caused by wind-blown litter, pests, and odor during operation (Chu 2008). Landfills are complex systems that only recently (last 20–30 years) have been comprehensively investigated. Most specific wastes that have been disposed in landfills have been created relatively recently and the time required for their complete decomposition is unknown. Early excavations of old landfills showed that in 15 years, 80% of the organic material in a municipal solid waste landfill (e.g., vegetables and specific food items) did not decompose. Modern landfills are equipped with various systems to prevent contact of waste with the environment. Consequently, the decomposition of waste in landfills is difficult to predict, such that landfills represent a kind of “time bomb” (Solomin, Negaduck, and Domarkiene 2006).
Treatment of hypersaline hazardous landfill leachate using a baffled constructed wetland system: effect of granular packing media and vegetation
Published in Environmental Technology, 2019
Naira Meky, Manabu Fujii, Ahmed Tawfik
The rapid increase of population in Egypt and human activities, including industry, agriculture, and urbanization, have increased the amount of the generated solid waste [1], which has been identified as an important issue with top priority in Egypt [2]. Therefore, proper management and final disposal of the generated solid waste continue to be a main environmental challenge worldwide and improving and expanding the solid waste management and disposal technologies are required [3,4]. Nowadays, in many developing countries, landfilling, rather than other technologies such as incineration or composting, is considered the most predominant technology for the treatment and final disposal of solid waste mainly due to its economic advantages. A landfill is a carefully designed and monitored site that is built into or on the top of the ground for the disposal of solid waste materials by burial to prevent contamination by the waste to the surrounding environment. Landfills can be classified into a sanitary landfill, municipal solid waste landfill, construction, and demolition solid waste landfill or industrial solid waste landfill. These landfills have been identified as a potential source of contamination of soil and ground and surface water due to the generation of a highly concentrated liquid known as leachate.