Landfill design and operational practices can beused, sometimes in combination with municipal solid waste(MSW) pretreatment techniques, to control effectively landfillbehavior. The effect of specific practices during landfill designand operation on landfill decomposition is an area that hasattracted investigation since the 1970s. Work has taken place onpractices such as leachate recirculation; layer (or lift)development; and buffer, nutrient, sludge, partially degradedrefuse and moisture addition. Much of this work was directed atthe use of methane as an energy source. These and othertechniques have led to the concept of the bioreactor landfill, inwhich the goal is to control or enhance decomposition within thelandfill, which usually includes enhancement of methaneproduction. This paper discusses techniques that can beimplemented either during design or operation of a landfillunder the bioreactor landfill concept. Several experiments haveshown that a necessary condition for methane enhancement is toovercome or minimize the acid generation phase. Moisturecontent and flow are known to be important factors affectingdegradation but should be considered along with bufferaddition if methane enhancement is an objective. In general,the effect of several design or operational techniques on landfilldecomposition seems to be a result of interactions between them,rather than individual effects and is often based on the principleof balancing the acid and methane generation stages of decomposition.
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