Approaches to landfill site selection in Ireland

Public acceptance is a major obstacle to the siting of landfills in Ireland. due to unsatisfactory past dumping practices. New national and EU legal requirements relating to landfill siting, design and operation have major implications for future site selection in Ireland. The trend towards the use of artificial geosynthetic liner systems and impermeable capping!;, so encapsulating the waste and isolating it from the natural agents of degradation, may have the effect of minimising waste degradation in landfills. This will delay ad infinitum, stabilisation of the waste to an inert state, raising the potential for future environmental accidents, so increasing the landfill operators liability to unacceptable levels. In the light of these uncertainties, greater reliance on the natural, geological barrier concept for landfills, where possible, would seem a much safer option, particularly in Ireland where suitable geological barriers are available. A programme for site selection and evaluation should ideally involve a two stage approach, a first screening stage leading to the targeting of areas suitable for the siting of landfills, and a second evaluation stage, involving the detailed assessment of individual sites within the target areas. An idealised first stage should take the form of a computerised G.I.S. approach to the delineation of target areas. In the second stage, the assessment programme should involve geological, geophysical and hydrogeological evaluation of the various potential sites. The ultimate aim of the evaluation process should be to produce a ranking of potentially suitable sites in order of preference, with details of deficiencies and proposed mitigation strategies to overcome them. Finally, it is essential that the selection process be conducted in an open and transparent manner, with involvement of the general public from the outset, and consultation with all interested parties at all stages of the selection process.