Reduction of methane emission from Klintholm landfill by use of Engineered Bio-covers

Landfills containing organic wastes produce biogas, and are significant sources of methane which contributes to climate changes. Some landfills are not or cannot be utilized for landfill gas. In these cases the gas is flared with risk of producing toxic combustion products, or is just escaping the landfill to the atmosphere. Experiments have documented that a very high methane oxidation rate can be obtained in bio-covers, high enough to significant reduce the methane emission from the landfill. Bio-covers may also be a very cost-effective supplementary method at landfills with landfill gas utilization, since the efficiency of the gas extraction system often is in the range of 50-60 %. However, the documentation of the efficiency of biocovers has so far not been carried out in full scale. This project will demonstrate the methodology in full scale on a landfill in Denmark, Klintholm Landfill, located in Fuen.