Estimation method for national methane emission from solid waste landfills

In keeping with the global efforts on inventorisation of methane emission, municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills are recognised as one of the major sources of anthropogenic emissions generated from human activities. In India, most of the solid wastes are disposed of by landfilling in low-lying areas located in and around the urban centres resulting in generation of large quantities of biogas containing a sizeable proportion of methane. After a critical review of literature on the methodology for estimation of methane emissions, the default methodology has been used in estimation following the IPCC guidelines 1996. However, as the default methodology assumes that all potential methane is emitted in the year of waste deposition, a triangular model for biogas from landfill has been proposed and the results are compared. The methodology proposed for methane emissions from landfills based on a triangular model is more realistic and can very well be used in estimation on global basis. Methane emissions from MSW landfills for the year AD 1980-1999 have been estimated which could be used in computing national inventories of methane emission. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.