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The use of landfill gas is considered a green fuel source because it offsets the use of environmentally damaging fuels such as oil or natural gas, destroys the heat-trapping gas methane, and the gas is generated by deposits of waste that are already in place. 450 of the 2,300 landfills in the United States have operational landfill gas ...
A gas flare produced by a landfill in Lake County, Ohio. Landfill gas is a mix of different gases created by the action of microorganisms within a landfill as they decompose organic waste, including for example, food waste and paper waste. Landfill gas is approximately forty to sixty percent methane, with the remainder being mostly carbon dioxide.
These gases can include methane (CH 4), carbon dioxide (CO 2), hydrogen (H 2), and volatile organic compounds (there are approximately 500 others that can be present in trace forms) from the waste on site and its degradation over time. Steps must be taken to prevent this migration from the landfill site as it might enter buildings in the vicinity.
Incineration, the combustion of organic material such as waste with energy recovery, is the most common WtE implementation. All new WtE plants in OECD countries incinerating waste (residual MSW, commercial, industrial or RDF) must meet strict emission standards, including those on nitrogen oxides (NO x), sulphur dioxide (SO 2), heavy metals and dioxins.
Monitoring of the landfill gas itself can be used diagnostically. When there is concern regarding the possibility of an ongoing subsurface oxidation event, or landfill fire, the presence in the landfill gas of compounds that are more stable at the high temperatures of such an event (above 500 °C) can be evidence for such a process occurring.
Across California, aging landfills have presented communities with myriad problems, as these sites have struggled to control flammable methane emissions and toxic air pollution. Berkeley Landfill ...
A gas flare produced by a landfill in Lake County, Ohio. Landfill gas is a mix of different gases created by the action of microorganisms within a landfill as they decompose organic waste, including for example, food waste and paper waste. Landfill gas is approximately forty to sixty percent methane, with the remainder being mostly carbon dioxide.
Landfill gas released in an uncontrolled way can be hazardous since it can become explosive when it escapes from the landfill and mixes with oxygen. The lower explosive limit is 5% methane and the upper is 15% methane. [16] The methane in biogas is 28 [17] times more potent a greenhouse gas than