The emission potential from municipal solid waste landfill in Jordan

A comprehensive study was conducted to monitor the emission potential from solid waste landfilled in Jordan over a period of 292 days using an anaerobic lysimeter. A 30 kg waste sample reflecting the typical municipal solid waste (MSW) streams generated in Jordan was used to simulate the influence of climate on the emission potential of landfills located in semi-arid areas. The experimental results demonstrated that a significant amount of leachate and landfill gas was produced. The methane content was found to be more than 45% and the leachate produced reached 15.7 l after 200 days. However, after 260 days the gas and leachate production rate became negligible. A significant amount of heavy metal traces was found in the leachate due to mixed waste disposal. Changes in biogas and leachate quality parameters in the lysimeter revealed typical landfill behaviour trends, the only difference being that they developed much more quickly. In view of current landfill practices in Jordan and the effect of climate change, the results suggest that landfill design and operational modes need to be adjusted in order to achieve sustainability. For this reason, optimized design parameters and operational scenarios for sustainable landfill based on the country’s climatic conditions and financial as well as technical potential are recommended as a primary reference for future landfills in Jordan as well as in similar regions and climates

Solid Waste Management in Jordan

Solid waste became one of the major environmental problems in Jordan, which has been aggravated over the past 15 years by the sharp increase in the volume of waste generated as well as qualitative changes in its composition. The challenges face solid waste management (SWM) in Jordan are numerous. Financial constraints, shortage of proper equipment and limited availability of trained and skilled manpower together with massive and sudden population increases due to several waves of forced migration. In this work we discussed these challenges; the main problems which stand against developing this sector to sustainable levels in the coming future are identified. Suggestions and recommendations that should be taken in consideration for developing the sector are also presente

Public Awareness and Willingness for Recycle in Jordan

Jordan has seen a large increase in population during the past five decades as a result of population growth and forced migrations, and also, accompanied with this increase, a cultural and economical development that has improved the standard of living and changing consumer habits in the community, resulting in a clear increase in the volume of waste. These changes urges the need for finding proper ways of making the living conditions for the people of Jordan more sustainable, recycling has been adopted as an important way to reduce waste and ease the use of landfills in many courtiers of the world. The residential area is a good place to start and practice recycling as a substantial part of all waste is generated there every day. This paper examines the level of willingness and awareness of recycling of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) among residential, with specific focus on university students. A total of 1000 residents were surveyed using 3 types of questionnaires designed to pattern their views on recycling of MSW and to test their willing for recycling, but also to examine their knowledge and awareness of recycling befits on a social, economical and environmental basis. In total 28 questions have been asked in a computer based survey to the students. The result clear that the recycling knowledge between respondent is very low. However, they hold a positive attitude toward the willing for learning more. Respondent also aware of the environmental and economical benefits from recycling, whereas they have negative attitude toward walking more distance and for paying more for better recyclin

Municipal Solid Waste Landfills in Jordan - Current Conditions and Prospective Future

Jordan has seen a large increase in population during the past five decades as a result of high population growth rate and forced migrations. Economical and cultural development has improved the standard of living and changed consumer habits in the community, resulting in an increase in the volume of Municipal solid waste (MSW) with time. World Bank visibility study (2004) showed that the rate of production of solid waste in Jordan was estimated annually of about 1.46 million ton, and is expected to reach 2.5 million ton by year 2015 with a generation of 0.9 kg/capita/day. This increasing in the amounts of MSW is not yet accompanied with the proper management practice in Landfilling resources. It poses negative effects on the human health and environment. Throughout the country there are 24 landfills handling Municipal solid waste; one of the landfills is designed for sanitary landfilling but the others don’t have even the simplest needed requirements at present. In this work we discussed the general issues of the current situation of landfills, a recent literature on landfills has been reviewed, and data on the total amount of generation, future production and the composition are presented. The review of the legislation indicates there is a need for a new developed regulation to deal with landfills in a clear framework. Also the main obstacles which stand against developing this sector to sustainable levels in the coming future are identified. Suggestions and recommendations that should be taken in consideration for developing landfills are also presented

Evaluation of Deferent Daily Cover Using Hydrus 2d/3d Simulation

The most important trends in landfill management policy over the last decade have been the universal adoption of the containment approach to emission control and the increasing legal requirement to install artificial membranes as bottom liners and caps to landfills which is now mandatory in many countries. The landfill cover is one of the most important aspects when designing and constructing landfills. The cover should minimize the quantity of water that infiltrates to the body of the solid waste landfills, reduce the rate of leachate generation, segregate solid waste from the surrounding environment, and control the risk of additional groundwater contamination and gas migration. Landfill covers are not standardized. Different covers have been proposed and executed all over the world. The selection of the suitable cover type is a big challenge especially in arid and semi-arid countries. Jordan is considered to be a semi-arid country. In Jordan, more than 20 landfills are in operation. Landfilling practiced in Jordan is generally dumping the waste in trenches with leveling and compacting by trash compactors to reduce the size and the thickness of the layers, and finally covering the waste with 0.5 m from the landfill soil in daily basis. This cover usually ends to be the cap during landfill working time and sometimes after closing. To assess the efficiency of a certain cover with particular concentration on landfills in arid and semi-arid areas, many field studies should be adopted along an extensive time period, confirming the efficiency of the landfill cover. Cost, time, and labor demands are still the major obstacles for conducting such field studies. Other methods should be considered for evaluation of the landfill cover efficiency and also supporting correct evaluation of the performance of landfill covers. Numerical simulation with appropriate soil parameters is an inexpensive, fast, and labor saved tool for modeling water flow and solute transport in saturated and unsaturated media

Current situation of municipal solid waste landfills in Jordan

Jordan has seen a large increase in inhabitants over the past five decades as a result of a high population growth rate and forced migrations. Economic and cultural development has improved the standard of living and changed consumer habits, resulting in an increase in the volume of municipal solid waste (MSW) over time. The rate of production of MSW has been estimated at about 1,964,284 ton annually with an average generation rate of 0.95 kg/ cap/day in urban and 0.85 kg/cap/day in rural areas (SWEEP, 2010) and is expected to reach 2.5 million ton by 2015. The major fraction of MSW composition is organic (Fig. 1), which implies a high moisture content value, as expected in a developing country where food is the major component of the solid waste stream (Abu Qdais, 2007). About 86% of the MSW is decomposable and recyclable, while the remainder is inert matter. The solid waste volume is still increasing at high rates due to the rapid population increase as well as the change in living standards and consumption patterns

Comparison of different waste management technologies in Jordan.

Solid waste management (SWM) strategies offer huge potentials to contribute to climate change mitigation. To assess the potentials of SWM to contribute to greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction and resource recovery, available technologies and strategies have to be analyzed. In this work, a SWM-GHG calculator was used to compare different potential strategies for waste management considering economic situation, environmental and social awareness in Jordan. Four scenarios representing the current and suggested technologies (increase recovery, biological treatment, and advance biological treatment) were studied. The results showed that a vast reduction of GHG emission of about 63,175 tons CO2-eq/year was observed in the fourth scenario where all the organic waste was recovered. Moreover, this scenario in-creased the net caloric values in reused waste from 8.4 to 9.6 MJ/kg. The results suggest that the SWM-GHG calculator can offer sufficiently accurate approximation of the GHG impacts of different suggested strategies in the country and can serve as an important contribution to decision makers