The daily cover on an operational

landfill A landfill is a site for the disposal of waste materials. It is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of waste with daily, intermediate and final covers only began in the 1940s. In the past, waste was ...

site is the layer of compressed

soil Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, water, and organisms that together support the life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from ''soil'' by re ...

or earth which is laid on top of a day's deposition of

waste Waste are unwanted or unusable materials. Waste is any substance discarded after primary use, or is worthless, defective and of no use. A by-product, by contrast is a joint product of relatively minor Value (economics), economic value. A wast ...

. Benefits of using daily cover include: * Reduction of odor and air emissions * Control of

disease vectors In epidemiology, a disease vector is any living agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen such as a parasite or microbe, to another living organism. Agents regarded as vectors are mostly blood-sucking ( hematophagous) arthropods such ...

(birds, insects, and rodents) * Improved surface stability for landfill vehicles * Control of litter * Reduction of

leachate A leachate is any liquid that, in the course of passing through matter, extracts soluble or suspended solids, or any other component of the material through which it has passed. Leachate is a widely used term in the environmental sciences wh ...

generation (cover reduces infiltration of rainwater and runoff into the waste mass) * Fire prevention (cover reduces contact of combustible materials with air and ignition sources, and can act as a temporary

firebreak A firebreak or double track (also called a fire line, fuel break, fireroad and firetrail in Australia) is a gap in vegetation or other combustible material that acts as a barrier to slow or stop the progress of a bushfire or wildfire. A firebre ...

) Work at the Fresno Sanitary Landfill was instrumental in establishing the need and utility of daily cover. Federal regulations in the United States require a minimum of six (6) inches of daily cover to be used at the end of each day. While soils are the traditional materials employed in daily cover, alternative daily cover (ADC) options such as "green waste", mixtures of paper sludge, tire derived aggregate (TDA) and geosynthetic membranes have displayed mechanical characteristics desirable for daily cover. When compared to traditional soil layers, the paper sludge paste was 2–3 times lighter, at least two orders of magnitude less permeable, and comparable in shear strength.Ng, Kelvin T, Irene M Lo, and Irene M Lo. 2007. Mechanical Behaviors of a Synthetic Paste of Tire Chips and Paper Sludge in MSW Landfill Daily Cover Applications. Canadian Geotechnical Journal. 44, no. 8: 928-941.

References

Landfill {{waste-stub

See also

References