Landfill seepage, costs up says BoH chairman - Worcester Telegram

In we see a citizen who is taking an interest in her local landfill, and really keeping her local council on the ball! Read the article quoted below and you will see just how well Ms. Cocalis has defined the leachate problem. I would say that she is a big asset to the community. I wonder whether, given as she says, that the landfill will continue to produce leachate for many years it would not be better to investigate building a dedictaed leachate treatment plant on the landfill site operated by the site staff. I have designed many of these and they have saved much money, and continue to do so,  the landfill owners a lot of money long term. Read on for the article:

Landfill seepage, costs are up says BoH chairman. So, an alternative model sought for leachate disposal

The Board of Health chairman, STURBRIDGE, said that not only has the level of seepage at the town's landfill gone up considerably, but the cost of removing the liquid pollutant is already way over budget. While the town allocates $26,000 for the collection of leachate at the landfill on Breakneck Road for the entire fiscal year, it has spent approximately $71,000 for leachate collection in the last six months, according to Board of Health Chairman Linda N. Cocalis. And the previous fiscal year cost was reportedly $76,000, which was $50,000 more (and triple) the original amount that was budgeted.

"I don"t know how many of you like to visit landfills and check them out? I do it as a hobby", Ms. Cocalis said, addressing the town administrator and Board of Selectmen earlier this week. "They should look as smooth as silk. They should be at about a 2 percent grade. If you are standing where the road is and you look down to where the refuge is in our landfill, there's approximately, a 6-foot drop with all the water from up here is all going down there. We don't want that. That is really, really bad."

Ms. Cocalis, who also refers to leachate as "garbage juice," blames the open cell being in the middle of two capped cells as the main culprit for the town?s increasing leachate problem. When the town capped its second cell at the landfill in 2009, they opened a new (and its final) cell, which is in the middle of two capped cells.

Last year, an estimated 2,462,000 gallons of leachate were collected from the landfill and taken to the wastewater treatment plant a few miles away for disposal. In 2010, an estimated 555,000 gallons were collected. Ms. Cocalis said every month, the town is spending $12,000-$13,000 in removal costs.

"Every day, there's a truck going there four or five times a day," Ms. Cocalis said. "The longer we wait, the more it's going to cost."

Ms. Cocalis suggested the town look into purchasing a 3,000-gallon pumper truck to collect the leachate, conducting a cost benefit analysis of the entire operation, immediately go out to bid for leachate collection and figure out ways to mitigate the amount of leachate seeping at the landfill.

Selectmen Chairman Thomas R. Creamer said he was alarmed by the "pretty tremendous rate" the leachate is increasing and the "inexplicitly rising" costs to collect it.

?To me, the biggest concerns are to identify why there has been nearly a 100 percent (price) increase already over last year?s number for the whole year, in the first six months, and, what alternatives does the town have in trying to reduce the costs,? Mr. Creamer said. ?We can?t keep going back to the residents on a regular basis, seeking emergency fund transfers.?

Town Administrator Shaun A. Suhoski said he has discussed an "alternative model" in leachate disposal, which includes bringing the process "in-house". Furthermore, a meter system has been installed in the wastewater treatment plant that will electronically monitor the amount of leachate treated at the plant, Mr. Suhoski said.

"We wish we had a little more time to get all the parties at the table and have a plan ready before we highlighted the problem", Mr. Suhoski said. I think bringing it to the Board of Selectmen's attention is helpful so the community is aware of this. By educating the community, now we can look at options, alternatives, for cost savings. And that's the plan. That's what we're doing".

"Ten years, maybe even longer, after we close that landfill, we will still have leachate", Ms. Cocalis said. "You will have to still collect it, by law, forever and ever, until it stops making leachate. There are landfills in Rome from the Roman times that actually still make leachate today".

View the original article here

Leachate Time Bomb in Cincinnati

Resident Jeff Moore must realise that he is right to be concerned. We quote below an article which suggests that a great folly was comitted when this landfill was allowed. Now it will inevitably cost a lot of money to protect a major water supply source:

JACKSON TWP. - Jeff Moore worries about the 1 billion pounds of toxic materials buried less than a half-mile from his home on Aber Road.

It's in a 208-acre landfill in rural, northeastern Clermont County - one of only two dumps in Ohio ever licensed to take hazardous waste. And while the site on Aber hasn't accepted such waste in more than 20 years, Moore knows it contains "some real bad stuff," including PCBs, benzene, arsenic, cyanide, toluene, mercury, pesticides and thousands more contaminants.

He fears that toxins could seep into groundwater and the creek that runs behind his home. And he questions what will happen when the owner's 30-year requirement to monitor the landfill expires in 2027.

Those concerns are shared by Clermont County officials and their environmental consultants, who for many years have pointed to troubling issues at the closed landfill known as Cecos. Since 1988, the county has spent $10 million on legal and consulting fees, mostly in an attempt to fix what it says are flaws in the existing plan to monitor the site.

"It's not so much that the county expects there to be an immediate major mishap. It's really about protecting us in the future," said county administrator David Spinney.

The county's biggest concern is that the landfill poses a potential threat to Harsha Lake, a main source of the county's drinking water.

While the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the landfill's owner say measures to protect the environment are in place and working as designed, the county contends that its statistical analysis of data that Cecos is required to report indicates some leakage has already occurred.

"Is it a catastrophic leak? No. Is this a precursor of what will continue to happen? The answer is yes. Eventually it will leak enough that it will present a problem," said Linda Aller, noting that such landfills were designed to contain material for 30 years. She is principal geologist with Bennett & Williams, a Westerville, Ohio-based environmental consulting firm that has been working on Cecos issues for Clermont County since the late 1980s.

Other technical experts hired by the county agree.

Brent Huntsman, president of Beavercreek, Ohio-based Terran Corp., is a geologist who specializes in ground water issues. Given the amount of waste at Cecos, he said, "it's just a matter of time before it escapes into the environment."

That has happened elsewhere. He points, for example, to U.S. Department of Energy hazardous waste landfills such as the Mound Site in Miamisburg. "If you look at all of their large installations, yes, all of their landfills have failed."

At Cecos, "It's going to be sooner rather than later," Huntsman said. "It's going to be within our lifetime."

That's why the county is spending an estimated $5.6 million to expand the water treatment plant at Harsha Lake and outfit it with a sophisticated granular-activated carbon filtration system, Spinney said. But even the new system, he added, "doesn't take care of everything" that might escape from the landfill.

For its part, the Ohio EPA said the current landfill monitoring plan, generally speaking, offers adequate protection. And it said Phoenix-based Republic Services Inc., which became the dump's owner in 2008 when it merged with Allied Waste Industries Inc., is fulfilling its monitoring requirements.

But those requirements are "grossly inadequate," said G. Fred Lee, an environmental consultant in El Macero, Calif., whose contract with Clermont County ended in 1999. Lee, a former university professor with a doctorate in environmental engineering from Harvard, has in the past five decades evaluated the environmental impacts of about 80 landfills, including Cecos.

Republic and Ohio EPA are working to resolve issues on a revised monitoring plan for the landfill, said Connie Dall, Republic's environmental manager at Cecos. She said the company hopes to submit an amended plan early next year.

But if the long, troubled history of Cecos offers any indication, a final resolution isn't likely soon.

Cecos dates to 1972, when Clermont Environmental Reclamation began operation of a 19-acre sanitary landfill. Within a few years, the U.S. EPA approved it for hazardous waste disposal, and the site eventually grew to 208 acres.

Clermont County documents say Cecos includes seven football stadium-sized excavations, or cells, up to 56 feet deep, each containing hazardous waste. Liners and recompacted clay are supposed to keep leachate - the toxic liquid that seeps through waste in the cells - from escaping.

The waste came from many sources, including chemical companies, power companies and businesses with household names, such as Procter & Gamble, IBM, General Electric and Westinghouse, Spinney said.

In the 1980s, criminal charges for violations of hazardous waste laws were brought against Cecos, and both the Ohio and U.S. EPA denied hazardous waste permits. By 1990, hazardous waste disposal had stopped.

Cecos submitted a plan, spelling out how the facility would be maintained and monitored. After a number of revisions, the Ohio EPA approved the plan in September 1994.

Clermont County appealed, saying the plan didn't provide adequate long-term protection to residents. The appeal dragged on for 13 years, never reaching a resolution.

So in 2007, the county decided to take a different approach. It reached a settlement with the Ohio EPA and Cecos, calling for Cecos to submit a revised monitoring plan and the county to submit a petition outlining its issues of concern.

The county's petition, filed last December, includes 2,358 pages of appendices and attachments in support of 15 issues the county says should be addressed. It asks, among other things, for continued or stepped-up monitoring of groundwater wells, leachate, surface water and underdrains, which are piping networks that detect leachate movement through the bottom of cells.

Bonnie Buthker, acting chief of the Ohio EPA's southwest district office, said some of Clermont County's requests can't be granted because they exceed the agency's regulatory authority. She declined to be specific, noting the county's petition is "still under review."

She did say, however, that EPA's interpretation of data submitted by Cecos indicates there has been no leakage from the cells that contain hazardous waste.

"Not from the cells, no," Buthker said. "Not in the 14 years we've been monitoring this."

But the county's consultants, using the same reported data from Cecos, arrived at a different conclusion.

"The consistent presence of volatile organic compounds in the underdrains in all the ... cells indicates that leachate is migrating into them. And once contamination enters the underdrains, it is no longer contained," the county says in its petition.

Spinney, who will retire as county administrator at the end of the year, said, "You'll never get me to say (the leakage) is minor. Is it a health hazard to people in the surrounding area or to the water supply today? No, I don't believe so from what I've seen. But it's an indication of a leak, which means there a potential for a health hazard in the future."

Dall said volatile organic compounds were detected in underdrains in the older part of the landfill, but that corrective measures were put in place to "close that off from the environment, so those (compounds) can't get anywhere. All the analysis we're getting is showing that everything is where it's supposed to be."

She said Republic is "making sure we are a good citizen in Clermont County and the state of Ohio. ... We are doing what the Ohio EPA and the U.S. EPA are asking us to do, and we're doing it appropriately.

"The facility is a safe facility."

As for the landfill's liners, two types were installed at Cecos to serve as a barrier between waste and the environment. Older cells have a 30-mil (slightly less than 1/32 of an inch) synthetic rubber liner; newer cells have an 80-mil (or slightly less than 1/12 of an inch) liner made of high-density polyethylene.

"These liners will fail," said Lee. "That's not a debatable issue."

Said Buthker: "It's really variable on how long liners can last. That's why you have other systems in place (such as wells, leak detectors and underdrains) to monitor to make sure if you have a leak, you can address it right away."

She added: "We feel the existing monitoring plan is protective. We're working to improve that monitoring plan."

Jeff Moore is wary. "Some people put their faith in the government, like they ain't never going to do (anything) wrong, but I'll tell you, I've seen it go the opposite direction on that," he said.

"You know what happened at Fernald," he added, referring to the former uranium-processing plant 18 miles northwest of Cincinnati. It was notorious for contaminating the environment and required a $4.4 billion cleanup.

Many of Moore's neighbors don't share his concerns. A reporter spoke with about a dozen homeowners on roads that border Cecos property, and most echoed the thoughts of Floyd Brate, a Smokey Road resident who said the landfill was a non-issue, "as long as they keep monitoring it like they're supposed to."

Ohio law requires such landfills to be monitored for 30 years after closure, which in the case of Cecos extends to 2027. At that point, the owner could petition to walk away.

"They would have to demonstrate that the waste was no longer there and no longer posed a threat," Ohio EPA's Buthker said. "That would be very difficult to demonstrate." She noted that Ohio's environmental regulations say the state EPA director can extend the monitoring period.

But Clermont County officials want more of a guarantee. They say that because most of the waste in the landfill will remain dangerous "virtually forever," a plan should be established to care for the landfill into perpetuity.

View the original article here

Dynatec Provides MBR System for Hazardous Landfill

The Problem

A hazardous waste landfill in Belleville, MI, owned by the Environmental Quality Company had a problem. They needed to develop a treatment process to remove COD, high TDS, heavy metals, phenol, PCB’s, Ammonia, and Molybdenum from the landfill leachate. Current treatment comprised of chlorination and activated carbon treatment was very costly.

Evaluation

The treatment process was challenging. The chemical treatment supplied was based upon the experience batch treating the wastewater and numerous bench scale treatability studies. An MBR process was selected for piloting because it was the best option to nitrify, reduce the high COD and phenol and overcome the potentially toxic conditions. Dynatec was engaged to supply a pilot treatment plant to be used as an investigative tool for the design of the full scale treatment process. The pilot operation phase of the project lasted almost 3 years, where problems were identified and solutions found.

Some unique challenges offered by this application were:

Foaming - Toxicity from the metals, phenol , and other unidentified substances

Mixed Liquor conditioning

Biological temperature sensitivity

Sensitive nitrification process

Difficult chemical precipitation of metals

Small footprint required

Dynatec was engaged to supply and install the full scale system because of Dynatec’s experience with the treatment technologies employed, their familiarity with the project, and the requirement for a high rate MBR process operating at high MLSS.

The Solution

Dynatec provided and installed a system that included a stainless steel insulated covered bioreactor with both heating and cooling capabilities to control temperature within a range suitable for achieving the treatment goals. To solve the foaming problem, a combination of jet aeration, defoamer, DO control, and concentrate return splash plates were employed along with an emergency potable water spray to prevent foam-over.

The membrane filtration equipment was designed to make efficient use of a small existing building that houses the membranes, controls, dewatering and other equipment.

The process includes chemical / physical treatment of the leachate both before and after the MBR. The post MBR chemical precipitation is for Molybdenum. The MBR removes compounds that were found to interfere with the precipitation process. The treated water is discharged to sanitary sewer.

A sludge tank receives the solids from both clarifiers of the pre and post chemical treatment systems as well as the WAS. Additional iron and lime is added and mixed in the sludge tank prior to feed to the filter press for dewatering. The solids are discharged within the landfill.

The Process

The process design consists of the following:

The hazardous wastewater is pretreated for removal of CN, Cr, Cu, Pb, Ni and Zn.The hazardous wastewater is mixed with non hazardous wastewater in a 500,000 gallon EQ tank to help make nitrification work. Approximately 65% of the wastewater discharged to the EQ tank is hazardous WW and 35% is non haz.The WW in the EQ tank is sent to the MBR for treatment for reduction in phenol ammonia nitrogen and COD.The MBR permeate is post treated for removal of molybdenum. The moly is apparently organically bound and does not precipitate adequately in the pretreatment.Sludge from the metals precipitation is mixed with WAS and dewatered in a filter press.

Operation

The system started up in March of 2010. As expected, the activated sludge took less than two months of conditioning before effective treatment was achieved due to the information and knowledge that was gained during piloting. A special bacterial culture was added to promote nitrification, which improved performance.

The COD  of the hazardous wastewater varies significantly, typical values observed have been between 5,000 mg/L and 12,000 mg/L. After blending with non hazardous leachate the COD is typically in the range between 3,000 mg/l and 6,000 mg/l.

The system operator is able to adjust conditions as needed. The system is currently operating at high mixed liquor concentration, an average of 24,000 mg/l. The jet aeration system makes operation at this level possible. Temperature ranges from a low of 25’C in the winter to 36’C in the summer. A natural gas fired heater heats the leachate in the winter in the recirculating loop between the bioreactor and the UF. The heater runs very little as the tank is covered and insulated. The system also has the ability to cool the mixed liquor as the temperature approaches 38’C to prevent thermophilic conditions from developing.

The continuous addition of defoamer is necessary. The concentrate return hits splash plates in the reactor to create a spray of sorts to help depress foam. There is also a fresh water spray available for use that rings the top inside of the reactor.

After startup, the system is operating as designed. The operators have used the emergency potable water spray to prevent foam-over of the bioreactor a couple times, with no other major issues. The system is exceeding expectations. Phenol in the effluent is typically below 0. 1 mg/L and metals removal is consistently below discharge requirements and below toxicity levels required to protect the biological process.

Conclusion

This is a very tough job. The complete and comprehensive system that Dynatec provided made this a success, and many lessons were learned for future projects. Dynatec was the right choice for this difficult MBR application. The many years of experience Dynatec has applying membranes to wastewater has enabled it to design and provide systems that perform in even the most difficult applications.

The system payback is expected to be very short. The system is meeting all its treatment objectives.

View the original article here

EU Citizens Never Have to Worry About Chemicals which US Landfill Operator Cleaning Up from Leachate

As an EU citizen it is easy to feel very smug. Once upon a time the US was regarded as an advanced nation, but in this article we are told about groundwater contamination from a chamical which is a liquid disposed to tis US landfill which has long been banned throughout all EU states. No EU landowner need fear that tetrachloroethene and trichloroethene will appear in their groundwater since the dispoal of hazardous chemicals like this, and indeed all liquids to landfill was banned more than 10 years ago. The US are crazy to still allow such practices. Read more and find out what this is all about:

One week after the Virginia Supreme Court overturned a $9 million judgment against Campbell County in a contamination lawsuit, officials said they remain committed to removing the leachate that got into the groundwater on Claude and Virginia Royals’ Rustburg property.

“We said from the beginning there was no question that the leachate was from the landfill,” said Campbell County Administrator David Laurrell. “We’ll continue to move forward until we completely take care of it.”

In 2002, the Royals discovered their well water had been contaminated by the neighboring landfill and for the last 10 years the county has been working to remove the chemicals.

Recent water samples show remediation is working, Laurrell said.

The Royals continue to use the well water on their property, avoiding the contaminated wells. They also have access to county water if they wish to connect to it.

Several times each year, Campbell County tests water from 51 sites on the landfill and the Royals’ property. The tests look for more than 200 different chemicals. Of the 3,800 recent test results, only 23 showed elements in the water at levels higher than allowed by the Environmental Protection Agency’s groundwater protection standards, said Clif Tweedy, deputy county administrator.

Tetrachloroethene and trichloroethene are two of the chemicals that continue to exist in the groundwater at amounts exceeding EPA standards. Tetrachloroethene, or PCE, is a synthetic liquid commonly used in the textile industry and in dry cleaning as a metal degreaser. It is considered a potential human carcinogen and consuming water with elevated levels over the course of a lifetime may increase cancer risk.

Under certain conditions, PCE in groundwater can degrade into trichloroethene, or TCE, and vinylchloride, which are more toxic.

Two of the 51 water sites tested have elevated TCE levels of 7 parts per billion. The maximum allowable by the government is 5 ppb.

When water treatment began in 2002, TCE was 136 parts per billion.

One site tested had an elevated PCE level of 8.3 parts per billion. As with TCE, the maximum allowable level is 5 ppb.

In 2001, TCE levels were as high as 29.8 on the site.

PCE and TCE — and benzene, vinylchloride and methylenechloride — are chemicals commonly found in landfills or in nearby leaks, said Tweedy.

At the Rustburg landfill, water testing shows the levels of benzene, vinylchloride and methylenechloride are so low they cannot be detected at most sites and where it does exist, it is well below the government requirements.

“I think the remediation is going much quicker than we originally thought,” said Laurrell, adding some of the Volatile Organic Compounds, or VOCs, have dropped by 95 percent.

“That’s just a remarkable improvement in a short amount of time,” he said.

In 2003, 95 percent of the wells tested showed contamination above allowable levels. Today, eight years later with an even greater number of wells in place, just .5 percent are above the standard.

The entire remediation system has been fully operational for two years.

The landfill received gas vents in 2002, a gas extraction system in 2003 and the first of several series of groundwater remediation wells in 2005.

Although the Supreme Court decision on Jan. 13 closed the case for the county, the Royals have until Jan. 23 to request a rehearing with the Supreme Court.

The Royals’ attorney has not revealed if the couple will pursue one.

View the original article here

US Municipal Body Which is Both Gamekeeper and Poacher Gets into Trouble with Leachate

It looks to me as if this is a simple case of municipal body which owns and runs this landfill is both gamekeeper and poacher has got into trouble, and the citizens would do best to change that situation first, rather than spend on a legal case arguing about it. Here is a quotation from the article:

The Citizens for Clean Water board of directors plans to discuss funding for a lawsuit to compel the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality to close the NABORS landfill in north Baxter County, according to CFCW president, Bob Cohee.

The CFCW board's next meeting is Feb. 7.

Cohee said Wednesday he will recommend the creation of a legal fund of at least $20,000 to move forward with the suit.

The suit, if filed, would mark the second time CFCW has called out the regulator in a court of law to enforce state regulations regarding the NABORS landfill. Cohee says the NABORS landfill has accumulated a long record of violations pertaining to overfilled areas within the landfill and a plume of pollutants seeping into sample waters taken from within and around one overfilled area.

The owner of the landfill? The Ozark Mountain Regional Solid Waste Management District ? has been trying to sell it for a year to North Arkansas Board of Regional Sanitation, an incorporation of Baxter and Marion counties and the city of Mountain Home. Investment bankers have declined to offer $17 million issue public revenue bonds to finance the transaction.

Ozark Mountain Regional Solid Waste Management District's board of directors voted Tuesday to set a March 13 deadline for the North Arkansas Board of Regional Sanitation proposal and to offer NABORS to other prospective buyers after that date.

"We are extremely opposed to privatizing," Cohee said. "The landfill is in bad enough shape as it is. Privatizing would be total havoc."

Citizens for Clean Water sued ADEQ in 1989 to compel the regulator to require former owners, RLH Inc., to stop leachate observed flowing from the side of a waste storage cell to an area of the landfill not served by a leachate retention pond. That outing resulted in a correction before the issue came to trial. CFCW's legal fee of $11,000, Cohee said.

RLH sold the landfill and a companion hauling service to Northwest Arkansas Regional Solid Waste Management District (now Ozark Mountain Regional Solid Waste Management District) for $12 million on Sept. 1, 2003, after two years of negotiations between RLH and ADEQ regarding ongoing regulatory violations.

On Sept. 23, 2005, the waste management district sought authorization to enlarge the storage area within the 700-acre tract situated 10 miles from Mountain Home's public water intake on Norfork Lake.

Several notices of violation from ADEQ between 2003-05 against RLH were settled early in 2005, with the district and RLH both signing a consent order in which RLH did not concede fault and ADEQ levied a $250,000 fine, then ADEQ's largest fine ever.

The agreement also included a corrective action plan regarding an overfilled area in the landfill which is now a five-year-old correction action plan and the subject of five failed attempts by four engineering firms to correct.

Inspectors in 2005 had found 101 inches of leachate on top of a geo-plastic liner permitted to hold only 12 inches, according to Bulletin archives.

ADEQ also has a $500,000 letter of credit from a bank guaranteeing funds to properly close the offending portion of the landfill should RLH shirk its responsibilities.

NABORS had consumed all of a $1 million line of credit from Arvest Bank when Ozark Mountain Regional Solid Waste Management District took control of the landfill in February 2009 from the Northwest Arkansas Regional Economic Development District.

NABORS finished 2008 with a deficit of $830,000 and lost another $945,000 in 2009.

View the original article here

Vilappilsala Leachate Treatment by Biomethanation Bound to Fail Long-Term

Existing leachate lagoon - where is the liner?

Nepal is so isolated in so many things, and presumably unable to engage top international advice, that it should engender sympathy for their struggle. Here is another example of that in the area of leachate treatment. They are intending to use Leachate Treatment by Biomethanation, which of course long term won't result in a leachate which is low enough in ammoniacal nitrogen to discharge safely either into a watercourse or even into a sewage works for further treatment. Plus, it won't protect their water supplies at all.

In any event if they have a lined landfill they will get Leachate Treatment by Biomethanation free, within the landfilled waste. They should be collecting the much larger yield of landfill gas from the landfill itself anyway, and if CDM is resurrected, they should be able to get Carbon Credits for that landfill gas to build their LFG extraction project.

They will in the end realise that they must treat their leachate aerobically in order to reduce the highly toxic ammonia component, and although biomethanation is fine if it. In order that you can follow this story I have quoted most of the article below. But, do follow the original article link below for the full story:

The agitation against the Vilappilsala solid waste treatment plant heads to another deadlock, the city Corporation is on a last-minute bid to operationalise a Leachate Treatment Plant (LTP) under construction there.
Leachate from the plant seeping into the nearby Meenambally canal and the resulting ground water pollution in the area has been among the main causes of concern for people of Vilappil panchayat and the Vilappilsala Janakeeya Samithi.
Despite the intensifying agitation and interventions by several authorities, including the Ombudsman for Local Self Government Institutions, the city Corporation has not been able to complete the work on LTP, more than a year after its deadline.
Apart from the 3,500-metre-cube collection tank and anaerobic pond, the construction of six other component tanks of the LTP is yet to be completed. However, instead of waiting for the completion of the whole project, the Corporation is now trying to direct and store leachate in the completed collection tank as a temporary measure to tackle water pollution.
On Monday, a team of engineers and officials from the Kerala Sustainable Urban Development Project (KSUDP) Project Implementation Unit of the Corporation visited the plant to assess how leachate from the accumulated garbage and various other points in the plant can be channelled into the LTP collection tank.
“Construction of the collection tank is over and leachate can now be stored in this tank. From here, it will be directed to the anaerobic pond where bio-methanation of the liquid will take place. The bio-filters in the pond will be installed within a week by which time we will also be laying pipes to channel leachate to the collection tank,” a project engineer said.
He said the bio-methanation process in the anaerobic pond, in its full capacity, will take around 70 days within which period other works on the leachate treatment plant would also be completed.
The LTP coming up at Vilappilsala follows a seven-step treatment method at the end of which the Biological Oxygen Demand in the waste discharge will be brought down to 30 mg per litre from 5,000 mg per litre. Corporation officials now say that the leachate treatment plant will be made fully operational by January, 2012. “Before that, we will solve the issue of water pollution,” said Deputy Mayor G. Happy Kumar.

While Leachate Treatment by Biomethanation will certainly reduce the Biological Oxygen Demand it won't reduce the ammoniacla nitrogen which is essential to remove to below 5 mg/l, and 7 steps seems excessively complicated for any leachate treatment plant. At some point they will need a simple SBR aeration leachate treatment plant of the type I have designed more than 30. (See http://leachate.co.uk for more information.)

Corporation Health Officer D. Sreekumar said the leachate treatment plant coming up at Vilappilsala would only be the second such plant in the country. “Nashik is the only municipality in the country to have an LTP of this magnitude and capacity. The lack of prior experience was also a reason for delay,” he said.

Keywords: Leachate treatment, leachate Treatment by Biomaethanation, agitation, solid waste treatment plant
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A Review of the New 2012 Edition of the "Introduction to Waste Technologies" eBook

New goods and services are continually coming on the web. It's tricky to keep abreast of them all. We become bored with the continuous notices for new releases, often just stop listening to them. Since there's so very little of worth in the majority of offers thrown at us, we become calloused and bored with them, usually just dismiss them all. Often this works O.K for us and saves a lot of time.

Infrequently though, there may be exceptions...

You will find surprising nuggets of value in-between your junk offers. For instance, there's an eBook within the waste technology and Mechanical Biological Treatment ( MBT ) category, named "An Introduction to Waste Technology" that has just been completely updated for 2012 and has just been placed for sale, which shows a lot of value.

It's been dreamed-up and developed by Steve Last, who's now offering it for sale. So let me know, why is it getting attention and gaining a following? Talking generally, what it has been doing currently is gradually selling since it was last updated in 2008.

You will find three unique strengths that make "An Introduction to Waste Technology" stick out from its competition, three principal positive aspects that consumers mention in their many testimonials. These three serious advantages are clear and concise outlines of every one of the main the waste technology and processes used to direct waste away from landfill, a writer who knows his subject and waste treatment process flow charts and tables of pros and cons for each waste technology described. Let's look at each one of these in greater detail.

Read the full review here:

A review of the New 2012 Edition of the "Introduction to Waste Technologies" eBook

or, click here here to go to the sales page.

Visit a Landfill in 2012 – A New Year’s Resolution for All Wasters!

Waste Appreciation : Visit A Landfill in 2012

Hello ! Happy New Year!

What about this to contribute to your list of New Year's Resolutions? I was convinced that I might pass on the contents of the e-mail below which might interest you and came from a reader, who wrote about how he went to a landfill for the first time in his life, in 2011. It was quite a cathartic experience for him:

The pleasant news is, it only took one quick trip to the landfill, for me to come to my senses and make changes about the way In which I do things and about the way In which I think.

If we aren’t thinking worldwide when talking about waste, and what we are leaving behind, we aren’t being smart. Grab some youngsters, or some forty-somethings and take yourself on a field expedition that may, do for you what it probably did for me ; make the changes that are necessary for me to see what the grim reality of our situation is and change the way In which I do things.

I suspect that there has to be many individuals who, like him, have busy lives, and before 2011, never gave waste disposal a lot of thought. Naturally I am really not recommending that you climb over a fence to go to a landfill. Most big and well run landfills presently supply a resource centre where college youngsters are educated about waste control and recycling during college trips, and a short telephone call to the landfill office before you leave should ensure you can select a timet when the facility will be open. Such facilities are customarily found at an easy to visit position on the landfill where there's also a landfill viewing point and the staff will often be available to reply to any questions you will have.

Whether or not the landfill does or doesn't have a visitor resource centre, in my previous experience the staff, (if given satisfactory notice) will probably be pleased to meet any local resident and show them around their landfill for 30 minutes. In reality as residents we will do a lot to help our landfill operators to maintain the best standards by doing this. Keeping a landfill clean is difficult work, it is way more rewarding if those doing it also feel the community cares about their landfill, instead of only ever just moaning when for some reason things go badly.

Hence how's that for a New Year's Resolution? Make that trip to a landfill! It could be quite an "eye opener" just as it was for our reader. Who knows, you may even come back impressed if areas of the landfill have been well revived.

Visit the original blog at, for the full story:

Visit a Landfill in 2012 – A New Year’s Resolution for All Wasters!

Leachate Quality from Landfilled MBT Waste

In recent times there's been a trend towards MSW leachates from Sanitary Landfills internationally getting more similar nonetheless, as Mechanical Biological Treatment is increasingly implemented and more Mechnanically Sorted Organic Residues [also called "residual waste"] is produced in the supply area for a rubbish heap, so that the leachate quality of the rubbish heap will change. 

If you were hoping to learn of a major decrease in the polluting potential of leachate produced from MSOR, from the bulk of sources, then this paper will dissatisfy you. That's clear from the source for this info, which is the work done by a UK research team during 2005, which was financed by the United Kingdom Environment Agency. The only really pleasant news is that typically, though not always, for all of the sources analyzed by Robinson, Knox, Bone, and Picken ; longer composting ( as an element of MBT processes ) did cut back the potential of the leachate produced. Sadly, hard COD values weren't found to have been reduced by MBT processing, and allegedly might be 2 to 4 times stronger than for equivalent leachate from MSW landfills, which should be a significant concern for the environment, and comprise high leachate treatment costs. Such leachates are also described as continuing for ; "at least several decades".

The sole consistent advantage reported is that leachate from MBT / MSOR wastes placed in methanogenic landfills don't reach the tops seen in Sanitary Landfills for non-pretreated MSW, in the first acetogenic stage. Hence the on-site or off-site treatment of the leachate may be simpler to achieve. Additionally, when effective MBT processes are applied, these can reduce concentrations of trace organics, and of Ammoniacal-N in leachates.

See the full article at:

Leachate Quality from Landfilled MBT Waste

Anaerobic Digestion News: Renewables Have No Prospect of Becoming Economical...

Anaerobic Digestion News: Renewables Have No Prospect of Becoming Economical...: Believe it or not, that headline is a direct quote from a new report from the right wing Adam Smith Institute, titled " Renewable Energy: V...

Leachate Pollution Risk May be Dismissed Too Soon in No Toxic Dam Danger Article

There appears to be a lack of knowledge of leachate contaminant dangers apparent in the following "No toxic dam danger? " article we have quaoted below. If the dam is significantly leachate contaminated then the ammonia present from leachate contamination is the most persistent and dnagerous, and it won't be removed at all by adding chlorine which is it appears, seen here as a disinfectant.

Has anyone tested the water for ammoniacal nitrogen concentration - apparently not - or landfill leachate contamination would show its presence, and at times only less than 5 mg/l will cause fish kills. Why disinfect - as the dead fish will raise the bacteria concentration in the watercourse back again. Read the article extract below:

HIBISCUS Coast Municipality has denied that its Oatlands landfill site in Ramsgate is “a disaster waiting to happen” after high levels of contamination were found in in the stormwater and leachate dams.

Yandisa Mhlamvu, waste management officer for the landfill site, told a media briefing, held yesterday especially to allay residents’ fears, that the municipality is treating both dams in isolation.

The municipality has contracted Ngcolosi Consulting Engineers to reduce the level of the leachate dam.

“Currently we have temporary pump system to cascade the water into the landfill site to keep the levels low. Ngcolosi Consulting has been contracted to put in a permanent pump, which is also part of the long-term solution.”

A senior civil engineer with Ngcolosi, William Tarume, said the project would be completed in the next six to eight weeks.
“Physical work on the site will start next week. We do not have a final cost of the project, but we have a rough estimate of between R700,000 and R800,000 at the moment.”

Mhlamvu said the pump was not installed during the construction of the leachate dam in 2009 due to financial constraints.
“The pump was to be added at the next phase of the project, which we are at now.” She pointed out that the leachate dam cannot be completely drained. “The dam has to have some water in it to protect the surface material of the dam from exposure”

She said treatment on the stormwater contamination dam started with 62 kilograms of chlorine added on Friday. The water will be tested today to see if the level of pollution has decreased to acceptable and legal levels for controlled releases to be made.

The departments of Water Affairs and Forestry and Agriculture will also have to okay the release. Mhlamvu said the municipality is confident that the treatment will be successful, but it has an alternative treatment if it the chlorine does not kill the bacteria. “We have other options for waste water treatment like membrane technology to make use of.”

Acting director for operations Mandla Mabece said the municipality wants to be totally transparent.

“We have nothing to hide and we want our end user to know that everything is under control.

“We are taking the situation very seriously. We do not want to compromise the quality of life of our residents or the tourists who visit us.”

View the original article here

Leachate Clean Up at a Closed Landfill - Success Announced

Don't you often get tired of the long succession of bad news stories throughout the media? Well at the "Leachate Blog" we are delighted to bring some good news for  change! The follwoing is a quote form the original article whioch appeared recently in the Little Falls Evening Times.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation recently reclassified the Rose Valley Landfill site as a Class 4 site on the Registry of Inactive Hazardous Waste Disposal Sites. The result is that Rose Valley Landfill site no longer considered to present threat says the Little Falls Evening Times.

As a Class 4 site, the property is no longer considered to present a significant threat to public health and/or the environment.
The site is in the town of Russia, on a parcel of land between Rose Valley, Bromley and Military roads. Finch Brook runs along the side of the property. It is currently owned by the Estate of Gerald Crouch and Joyce Miller. Crouch was the owner-operator of the Rose Valley Landfill from 1963 to 1985, the time it was a hazardous waste disposal site. As a result, the site was added to the Registry of Inactive Hazardous Waste Disposal Sites as a Class 2 site in 1992. In 1998, the site was added to the State Superfund Program.
The DEC was concerned about levels of 1,1,1, TCA, 1,1,1-Trichloroethane (TCA) and 1-1-Dichloroethane in the soil and groundwater. The levels of these contaminants are unknown.

Tne well from a nearby residence was contaminated. A new well was drilled in 2006 and was still uncontaminated in 2009.
Remediation of the site was finished in spring 2008. It included consolidating contaminated soil on-site and placing it beneath a soil cap and erecting a fence to restrict access to the landfill.

A long-term monitoring program exists for the site which includes the collection and treatment of groundwater and leachate (water that carries in solution materials from the soil it has passed through). The site management plan and environmental easement addressed the remaining site contamination.

View the original article here

Residents oppose Guatali landfill - Pacific Daily News

We quote from a news item below which is about a landfill from which leachate will be trucked out to a sewage wroks for treatment. In most coases this is more expensive than buidling a leachate treatment plant on-site (see the leachate treatment website, and the fact is that these won't be the same vehicles  either. Leachate has to be transported in tanker vehicles and the waste come in in waste collection vehicles, and bulk waste trucks!

Read the following quote and you'll understand what I am saying:

Guam's new landfill hums along in Inarajan, but a plan to build a smaller landfill with a waste-to-energy incinerator continues in Santa Rita despite objections from nearby residents.

Nearly 100 people attended a passionate public hearing last night, most objecting to plans for the Guatali Municipal Solid Waste Landfill.

"We don't really need another landfill right now," said Debora Moore. "We already have a brand-new landfill. ... I'm against it and I felt like I should speak out against it."

It was short, simple criticism, but Santa Rita residents clapped and cheered when she finished. It was like that for most of the evening's testimony.

Last night's hearing was held by the Guam Environmental Protection Agency to collect comments. The agency is considering issuing a permit for Guatali landfill plans. The deadline to submit testimony is Friday.

The company behind the project is Guam Resource Recovery Partners, which plans to stockpile waste on leased GovGuam land, then start incinerating the garbage to make energy, according to an impact assessment of the project.

If Guam EPA issues a permit, the Guatali facility will be built on an 87-acre land parcel in Santa Rita, just north of Apra Heights and uphill from the Atantano River, the impact assessment states. About 22 acres of savannah would become waste storage cells, bracketed by small wetlands to the east and west, the assessment states.

The waste stored in the cells is expected to generate about 36,000 gallons of leachate daily. Some will be absorbed by filtering the leachate back through the landfill; the rest would be trucked to the wastewater treatment plant in Hag't'a, the impact assessment states.

That's how the landfill would work, trucking garbage in and trucking leachate out, for the first three to five years, by which time Guam Resource Recovery Partners hopes to have its waste-to-energy incinerator running.

The company's incinerator efforts have been wrapped up in a court battle for about a decade. If Guam Resource Recovery Partners ever gets approval for the facility, it would run for 11 months a year, the assessment states......

....The impact assessment states repeatedly the Guatali landfill is needed to close the Ordot dump, which will improve quality of life on Guam. The document was last revised in January, so it doesn't reflect that the Ordot dump has been closed for almost three months.

That begs the same question that surfaced at the Santa Rita hearing: Does Guam need two landfills?

When asked yesterday about the justification for a second landfill, Guirguis said the island didn't need two landfills. However, Guirguis insists the Guatali proposal -- not the finished landfill in Inarajan --is better for Guam.

Guirguis said the Inarajan landfill will reach its 50-year life expectancy only if GovGuam continues to build more storage cells, expanding the landfill footprint. In contrast, once the Guatali facility starts incinerating waste, it won't need to expand its landfill component, Guirguis said.

Guirguis said the Guatali landfill also is preferable because it will be cheaper than the government landfill. Tipping fees already have been increased.

View the original article here

Water Quality Violations Cost Long Prairie Packing Co. $52000 - Water World

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency issued the following news release seems surprising. If, as seems to be being suggested in this news release the perpetrator was breaking the envirnomental law, these people are environmental criminals, so why was there an agreement when this should have gone to court? In such cases the litigant should pay all the costs and not the state, so what possible reason can these be for this?

Am I being too Machiavellian by noting that actually there was a reason for Long Prairie Packing to come to an agreement as they want to develop an AD Plant:

Long Prairie Packing Co., LLC, and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) recently reached an agreement that requires the company to pay $52,000 for alleged water quality violations. The violations occurred between fall 2009 and spring 2010 at the company's facility in Long Prairie, Minn.

According to MPCA staff inspection reports, the company improperly stockpiled and land applied industrial byproducts, and failed to maintain a required 600-foot land application setback from surface waters at seven sites. Some of the land applications occurred within farmed wetlands. The company also failed to notify the MPCA or immediately recover blood-contaminated leachate which spilled out of a dumpster and a large storage tote; improperly stored more than 500 gallons of used oil; and operated parts of the facility without a required federal and state industrial stormwater permit.

Of the $52,000 civil penalty, half will be paid to the MPCA, and half will be spent on completing a supplemental environmental project. Long Prairie Packing Co. plans to construct an industrial anaerobic digester near the plant that will reduce the amount and toxicity of pollutants entering area waters, and significantly reduce the land application of industrial byproducts. The digester will produce biogas, which will help reduce dependency on coal-powered energy sources. The company has also completed a series of required corrective actions.

View the original article here

Leachate Odor Causes Tempers to Flare at Clean Harbors Meeting

Leachate odor can be extremely unpleasant. It can actually get into your clothes and even days later be smelled in them. That's why we have every sympathy for the complainants in this case. Here is a quote from the article recently published:

BRIGDEN — A public meeting on Nov. 15 that was meant to reassure neighbors of Clean Harbors's hazardous waste site was reduced at times to a shouting match. About a dozen of the 50 in attendance stormed out of the Brigden Fair exhibition hall in frustration.


(The above video is not connected to the article other than the fact that it attests to the odor potential of leachate.)
"We've listened to your dog and pony show. Now it's time to listen to us," yelled an angry Butch Houle.
He and many other neighbours of the Telfer Road facility have been disturbed by a stench intermittently coming from Clean Harbors since August.
The odour, which the company says comes from too much on site eachate, has driven neighbours from their homes, made them nauseous, stung their eyes and sent at least one man to hospital.
"When the ministry (of environment) ordered two truckloads removed from the site every day, why wasn't that achieved?" Norm O'Neill demanded. "It's all a smoke and mirrors game."
"We are not being heard. Our concerns are not being addressed," said Joe Dickenson, a Lambton County beef farmer.
"I think a lot of this issue is airborne, not necessarily leachate; but all you do is focus on leachate because it might be the easiest thing to address."
Many people called for the plant to shut down.
"I'd like you to clean up your mess and go home," one man shouted.
For most of the two-hour meeting, Clean Harbors's management sat quietly at the back of the room.
General manager Chris Brown spoke briefly, apologizing for the stench and promising the company is working to correct it.
"The company is committed to fixing this issue," he said. "We deeply regret this summer's odours."
Rod Brooks, a representative from Ortech Environmental, spoke about air sampling on 10 occasions during odour events.
The air is tested for 38 Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)and none surpass regulatory standards, he said.
Greg Ferrar, senior environmental engineer with Conestoga Rovers & Associates, said his company is hired to devise a leachate abatement plan and focused on reducing the amount of leachate generated as well as reducing the amount already on-site through incineration.
But most of the meeting was conducted by a hired facilitator, Bryan Boyle, who allowed few to speak. Instead, he tried to engage the angry group by having them write down their thoughts about Clean Harbors and what they believe the solution to the stench might be.
Many in the crowd didn't want to write anything down.
"Forget this Romper Room nonsense," said Jim Stenton of Petrolia Line. "We want answers because we're stunk out of our homes.
"You're wasting our time," he hollered."
One resident walked up to the front of the hall and stuck a note on the wall that read: "As usual, all talk, no action."
"I want people from Clean Harbors to hear the emotion that I hear and I want them to come up and tell us what they are going to do," said St. Clair Township Mayor Steve Arnold.
It was only after several got up and left in anger, that the company's senior vice-president of regulatory affairs spoke.
Phil Retallick said exhaustive studies confirm the odour is coming from leachate, not the plant's incinerator or a new Thermal Desorption Unit.
"It's sulfites in the leachate and it doesn't contain carcinogens or other toxic compounds," Retallick said.
"There are no compounds of any risk associated with the vapours, but it is a nuisance and we will deal with that. Our experts say it will take four to six months depending on the rainfall this winter."
Retallick said Clean Harbors has no choice but to reduce its on-site leachate by May because of a directive from the Ministry of Environment.
There will be further public meetings about odour abatement, he said.

View the original article here

Avoiding Over Reliance on the Hydrologic Evaluation of Landfill Performance (HELP) Computer Program

We have published an article on our main leachate web site about predictive modelling of leachate generation volumes. Unfortunatly, the best calculations done in this way are looked upon as the best acheivable, but have on many occasions not been as accurate as anticipated or needed. Go see our article by following the link below if you would like to find out why we think this is occurring.

Avoiding Over Reliance on the Hydrologic Evaluation of Landfill Performance (HELP) Computer Program

Lagoon Treatment of Leachate Added by Bi-County Solid Waste Management

Bi-County Solid Waste Management expects to save up to $20,000 each month with the help of its latest step toward self-sufficiency.

The Montgomery County landfill's executive director, Pete Reed, said the majority of leachate, or contaminated water, on the site will eventually be treated in the lagoon that began holding water after the May 2010 flood that shut down Clarksville's wastewater treatment plant.

"They had to put a permit on us and start charging us $9,000 to 10,000 a month, but if we had a parameter that goes above, then we had ... surcharges that could be an additional $15,000 in that month," said Reed, who added that the landfill went above that parameter 2-3 times a year.

As those costs started to build, along with the high costs of hauling the leachate off the site, Reed said the decision was made to create a $750,000 system featuring the lagoon that holds 1.3 million gallons and will be able to decontaminate the water over a 30-day period.

Three separate pools hold the water that is pumped in from various locations throughout the site. The two pools with a white foam layer on top are anoxic zones, meaning aerators pump in oxygen, while the middle pool is anaerobic, with a pump that puts in a different mixture of chemicals.

Beginning in May of this year, Reed said micro-organisms that are trained to eat ammonia and other chemicals were added to help treat the water by releasing the nitrates and taking out any odor. Although Reed said the pools have reached the optimal amount of the "bugs" that come from Paris, Tenn., it will still be a few months before the system is fully operational.

Reed said the lagoon has already ensured the landfill won't go beyond its monthly parameters at the wastewater treatment plant, and eventually the treated water will overflow into a clarifier that will filter out the sludge and transport the clean water to a 7 million gallon holding pond adjacent to the lagoon. That water will be used for irrigation on the grass at the site, as well as the nearby woods and, if it's clean enough, into local streams.

Depending on the season, Reed said the system could put out about a million gallons each month. Before it can be used for irrigation or anything else, several samples of the water will have to be approved by the state.

Even with the new system, some leachate will still go to the wastewater treatment plant, but the cost of the permit and the manpower required will be reduced significantly. Reed said he doesn't expect the loss of income from the landfill to have much effect on the plant's bottom line, since it's expanding and gets plenty of money from industrial sources.

"We hope that by this time next year, we'll be pretty much self-contained," Reed said. "Nothing will have to go out, other than (recyclables)."

View the original article here

Landfill and Groundwater Contamination

Approximately 100 million tonnes of waste are disposed of each year (comprising Municipal Solid Waste and Industrial/ Commercial Wastes) at the many licensed landfill sites operating in England and Wales. However space for landfilling at these locations is due to run out in the very near future, so many people need to be told about them, so that new landfills can be planned. It will always be necessary to have some landfills. Although zero waste is a great aspirational target, at some point before zero, the law of diminishing returns will always set in, and the energy used apart from the cost of avoiding that last few percent of waste, will always make zero waste an unachievable target.

When rainfall soaks into waste in a garbage tip it slowly drains through the waste under gravity. As it does so it picks up soluble contaminants from the waste itself. This produces a very strongly organically contaminated liquid which is called leachate. Most of the contamination is biological (organic) in nature, but whatever soluble contaminants are present in the landfill, the leachate will probably also contain them in small quantities. The leachate will also have dissolved methane in it if it comes from a gassing (biogas producing or âmethanogenicâ) landfill.

If there is no base lining the leachate will drain away through any reasonably permeable material which exists under the landfill. Although this material below the landfill may do some filtering and further cleansing of the leachate, it can enter the underground strata still in a highly polluting condition. Water flowing in subterranean rock, through cracks and fissures and through any permeable material is called groundwater.

In many parts of the developed ad developing world this groundwater will be used for drinking and cooking. It will obviously be dangerous to human health for people to imbibe this flow. This will happen if and when pumped out for use from contaminated strata, or where the groundwater emerges at the surface.

Groundwater moves slowly and continuously through the open spaces in soil and rock. If a landfill contaminates groundwater, a plume of contamination will occur wherever reasonably permeable material exists below, for example a private property plot.

Any groundwater which gets polluted will still keep flowing underground and although the ground may help to naturally filter and biologically treat the leachate, eventually the pollution flow may grow and the small extent of a polluted area shown initially may later have to be extended if a growing contaminant plume develops, and nearby water resources including water supply boreholes can be contaminated. If they do they will probably remain unusable for several generations. Such a loss of something as precious as water is a terrible problem for later generations.

So, is it any wonder that environmental activists dislike landfills not only because of the potential for pollution just described, however, the more astute among them also dislike landfilling because landfills permanently remove large quantities of raw materials from economic use.

All of the energy and natural resources (such as water) that were used to process the items "wasted" are also not conserved.

Environmental Protection Agencies in many countries generally rely on the laws in their states to enforce their own operating permits and federal laws. If state agencies are not aggressive, violations can worsen, multiplying negative environmental impacts exponentially. Environmental pollution of land, air, and water created by the world's poorly-managed landfills is enormous.

In the early 21st century, alternative methods to waste disposal have been devised, including recycling, converting to biodegradable products, incineration and cogeneration facilities, and sustainable development, all of which assist in reducing global landfill pollution.

Steve Evans is an authority on landfill liabilities and Global Warming effects visit any one of the product and resource links we give here and you will not be disappointed. Landfill Problems and Global Warming Effects are just two of many issues on which we comment, plus educational and general information available free, if you visit the Landfilling Site web site.

High water levels hinder leachate pipeline construction project in Caribou area

CARIBOU, Maine — High water levels of the Little Madawaska River have hindered two pipeline construction projects, both literally a stone’s throw from completion.
Standing on the bank off Grimes Mill Road on Sept. 9, Mark Draper watched as water rushed downstream at 917 cubic feet per second — more than 800 cubic feet per second higher than normal based on a U.S. Geological Survey average for the last three years.
“Last year at this time you could walk across this river and not get your feet wet,” said Draper, solid waste director of the Tri-Community Landfill.
Tri-Community Landfill is 175 feet from completing a 2.3-mile pipeline project to connect the landfill to the Caribou Utilities District, where the landfill’s leachate — water that has come into contact with garbage — will be treated.
Until the pipeline is completed, Tri-Community employees will continue hauling the leachate to the CUD one 6,300-gallon truckload at a time.
As Draper explained, CUD didn’t have the capacity to accept Tri-Community’s leachate when the landfill was first built, and there wasn’t a feasible way to pipe the leachate to Fort Fairfield for treatment.
Now that Caribou has the capacity for the leachate, the pipeline will save Tri-Community employees roughly 1,000 trips a year hauling approximately 6 million gallons of leachate.
But nature seemed to have other plans for the project as record-setting precipitation this summer has caused the Little Madawaska River to swell and rage along. Workers with Soderberg Construction considered building a cofferdam to push river water to one side in order to lay two 6-inch pipes across the riverbed — one pipe for daily operations and the other as a backup. But the high, rushing water dampened that plan.
Instead, officials with Tri-Community and Soderberg opted to go with directional drilling under the river — essentially drilling down from one bank, under the river, and over to the opposite bank.
Subcontractors with Enterprise Trenchless Technologies Inc. of Lisbon Falls were on-site Tuesday afternoon for the directional drilling under the river, which will allow the two ends of the pipeline finally to meet after a season of opposing each other from the banks of the Little Madawaska. The project is likely to be completed this week.
Expediting the weather-delayed project by drilling and essentially bypassing the river will cost an estimated $18,000. That cost will be split between the contractor and Tri-Community. The total projected cost of the leachate pipeline project is approximately $1.7 million, which includes engineering, easements for right of way, environmental permits and construction.
What Draper found most frustrating was that the rain not only delayed the project but also added to the amount of leachate that needed to be treated.
But Tri-Community Landfill isn’t the only entity that has been trying in vain to cross the Little Madawaska River this summer; just downstream, the Greater Limestone Water and Sewer District also is just shy of completing a pipeline project. That district is trying to connect to an existing Caribou Utilities District pipeline so its treated waste can reach the Aroostook River.
Limestone Water and Sewer Director Jim Leighton explained that directional drilling isn’t an option for that project because the pipe the district plans to run under the river has a diameter of 21 inches.
Like the Tri-Community project, efforts to build a cofferdam earlier this summer were a wash.
“So now we’re doing the waiting game,” Leighton said.
Since Sept. 6 and 7, when the river was rushing at more than 2,500 cubic feet per second — bearing in mind a gallon of water weighs just more than 8 pounds — the water level has been dropping steadily. At the beginning of this week, the river was “down” to 374 cubic feet per second. Waiting out the weather isn’t a problem for LWSC, as a few weeks’ delay won’t change the project’s cost.
Leighton is confident that the project will find a window this fall.
“This [pipeline under the river] will connect us to the Aroostook River, then it’s just a matter of turning a couple of valves and we’ll be able to start utilizing the pipeline,” Leighton said.
Leighton also pre-emptively clarified that while the Greater Limestone Water and Sewer District is connecting its pipeline with that of the Caribou Utilities District in order to reach the Aroostook River, all of Limestone’s wastewater still will be treated in Limestone — it’s not being transported to Caribou. Rather, LWSD is using the same diffuser pipe as CUD to discharge into the Aroostook River.
View the original article here

Managing the legacy of landfill - Waste Management World

Eastern Daily Press - September 24, 2011

The vast mountains of decaying rubbish buried beneath Norfolk's landscape may be hidden from view - but their potential environmental consequences are not so easily masked. Waste dumped by generations of families and businesses is still decomposing, oozing toxic chemicals and greenhouse gases which could threaten their natural surroundings.

But the challenge of managing our landfill legacy is being met through an innovative engineering effort, while policy-makers continue battling to find more sustainable ways to dispose of the refuse left by a growing population.

Norfolk County Council is responsible for more than 150 closed landfills, of which six are the larger "permitted" sites which were still operating by the time new environmental regulations came into force in the 1990s. Teams of technicians work to a double remit: to monitor and minimise the ecological impact of gas and leachate generated by so much buried waste, and to find ways to maximise income from its useful by-product - methane.

Turning the greenhouse gas into energy at four sites is currently worth about £280,000 per year to the county council, 22pc of the total costs for managing the authority's closed landfills.

Meanwhile, water percolates through rotting rubbish, collecting chemical contaminants as it goes, and the resulting leachate must be routinely monitored, abstracted and sent away for treatment. In all, keeping permitted sites in compliance with environmental regulations costs taxpayers about £1.4m per year.

Bill Borrett, Norfolk's cabinet member for environment and waste, said: "I think people have got to understand more about landfill, because once you understand the amount it costs, the environmental hazards and the amount of space it takes up, people become more aware of the legacy of their waste and the importance of recycling.

"It is not simply put into a hole and forgotten about - there is years of work in maintaining the land after that." The site at Mayton Wood, near Coltishall, accepted 1.5m tonnes of commercial, industrial and household waste between 1971 and 2003. The waste is grouped into huge domed "cells" contained by a liner and capping system.

The base of the landfill consists of a clay base, followed by a waterproof plastic membrane which is protected by a shingle or sand drainage layer above it. At the top, a similar set of layers encase the waste - along with the gas and liquids - in an impermeable bowl, with the angled sides draining any leachate to a collection sump at the bottom. Meanwhile, rainwater is prevented from getting into the landfill, and is instead channelled to the perimeter across the domed surface.

Hydrogeologist Tim Wilkins regularly samples, monitors and controls leachate levels with the help of a computerised system of wells and pumps. "Leachate is what you get when water percolates through the waste and picks up contaminants," he said. "Some of it comes out looking like coffee and smells quite nasty. The main constituent is ammoniacal nitrogen, and it can be quite toxic to the aquatic environment.

"We have got 11 wells on this site and each has a pump and a level sensor which sense the level of the liquid. The pumps are operated automatically when the leachate reaches a level of one metre above the base layer. "All the permitted sites are now within compliance, but when we took them over (in 2008) they generally had 14-15 metres of leachate. They were all saturated, which meant there was more chance of the leachate escaping."

About 70 gas wells are also sunk into the Mayton Wood waste to harness landfill emissions which are typically 45pc methane, 25pc carbon dioxide and the remainder mostly nitrogen. The gas is drawn into perforated pipes which reach 10 to 16m underground to the base of the cell, and are connected through a network of sealed pipes above ground to a powerful fan at the on-site energy plant. The generator draws in 450 cubic metres of gas per hour and converts it to electricity which is sold on to the National Grid, with the profits shared by the council and the private plant operator.

Des Holmes, the council's landfill gas project officer, said: "We're talking about the equivalent of 45 double-decker buses full of gas
being sucked out of the ground every hour. The whole site is under negative suction. "The machinery is basically like a large diesel engine that has been converted to run on landfill gas.

It produces 600kW/h, enough for 500 homes, and it is constant. The only time it stops is when it breaks down, but it can keep going at that rate 24 hours a day, seven days a week. "The gas will diminish over the years, but I reckon we have got about 15 years until it stops becoming economic to produce electricity here." Gas production at closed landfills is estimated to reduce by 10pc each year as the waste degrades, prompting efforts to find more innovative ways of squeezing every last pound out of the resource. The council's strategic waste manager Paul Borrett said there was a "fine balance" between preventing rainwater seeping into the site, and keeping the waste damp enough to maintain chemical reactions.

"The amount of rain water that collects on the site is more than we can cope with, but we want the waste to stay wet so it continues to produce gas," he said. "In trying to reduce the 'tail' of the gas production, we are looking into recycling some of the leachate we have collected back through the waste. Once it gets saturated or if it dried up, we have got no gas production and no income - so it is a fine balance." The generating plant at Mayton Wood also contains a gas flare, to safely burn off any potentially dangerous pressure build-ups of methane, which is estimated to be 21 times more dangerous as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.

Work on the landfill is continuous as the waste compacts, changing the shape of the cap and the effectiveness of the wells. But Paul Borrett said although it could take several decades for landfills to settle, there were plenty of examples of where they had been replanted as woodland, public amenities or even a pitch and putt course.

"A lot of people's view of landfill is a big pit where people throw rubbish away - an eyesore," he said. "But we have moved on from that. We manage our landfills here in Norfolk and you can absolutely get to the point where they can be turned into something that's more useable - but we do have ongoing respon-sibilities and liabilities."

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