Anaerobic Treatment of Municipal Solid Waste Landfill Leachate

Abstract

Leachate is a liquid that is passing through matter, extracts solutes, suspended solids or any other component of the material through which it has passed. Leachate from a landfill varies widely in composition depending on the age of the landfill and the type of waste that it contains. The main environmental problems at landfill sites are the infiltration of leachate and its subsequent contamination of the surrounding land and aquifers, odour problems etc. Improvements in landfill engineering are aimed at reducing leachate production, collection and treatment prior to discharge. A very wide range of landfill leachate treatment processes have been applied to leachate treatment with varying success. Biological treatment is treatment in its fullest sense, and will remove most contaminants, by a natural conversion into far less harmful substances. It is a natural process using organisms naturally available within the environment. Due to various advantages of anaerobic biological treatment. we opt it for leachate treatment by means of UASB bioreactor. In study, Reactor operated at 3 different processes i.e. batch process, semi-continuous process and continuous process. In which we found best results in semi-continuous process. Following results were obtained at semi-continuous process at 3 day HRT with 96.6% COD reduction, TVA reduced from 954 mg/L to 20 mg/l, alkalinity increased from 160 mg/L to 1180 mg/L. Total solid reduction was 68.14 %, suspended solid reduction was 86 %, volatile solid reduction was 86.7% and biogas production was 2650 ml.