Hazardous materials in Fresh Kills landfill
- Hirschhorn and Associates, Wheaton, MD (United States)
No environmental monitoring and corrective action programs can pinpoint multiple locations of hazardous materials the total amount of them in a large landfill. Yet the consequences of hazardous materials in MSW landfills are considerable, in terms of public health concerns, environmental damage, and cleanup costs. In this paper a rough estimation is made of how much hazardous material may have been disposed in Fresh Kills landfill in Staten Island, New York. The logic and methods could be used for other MSW landfills. Fresh Kills has frequently been described as the world`s largest MSW landfill. While records of hazardous waste disposal at Fresh Kills over nearly 50 years of operation certainly do not exist, no reasonable person would argue with the conclusion that large quantities of hazardous waste surely have been disposed at Fresh Kills, both legally and illegally. This study found that at least 2 million tons of hazardous wastes and substances have been disposed at Fresh Kills since 1948. Major sources are: household hazardous waste, commercial RCRA hazardous waste, incinerator ash, and commercial non-RCRA hazardous waste, governmental RCRA hazardous waste. Illegal disposal of hazardous waste surely has contributed even more. This is a sufficient amount to cause serious environmental contamination and releases, especially from such a landfill without an engineered liner system, for example. This figure is roughly 1% of the total amount of waste disposed in Fresh Kills since 1948, probably at least 200 million tons.
- OSTI ID:
- 353624
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-970677-; TRN: IM9929%%170
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 90. annual meeting and exhibition of the Air and Waste Management Association, Toronto (Canada), 8-13 Jun 1997; Other Information: PBD: 1997; Related Information: Is Part Of 1997 proceedings of the Air and Waste Management Association`s 90. annual meeting and exhibition; PB: [7000] p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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