N2O emissions from municipal solid waste landfills with selected infertile cover soils and leachate subsurface irrigation

This study presents the field investigations into the effects of cover soils and leachate subsurface irrigation on N2O emissions from municipal solid waste landfills. Landfill Site A and Site B, covered with carefully chosen infertile soils, were selected to monitor their diurnal and seasonal variations of N2O emissions. The annual average N2O flux was 469 ± 796 μg N2O-N m−2 h−1 in Site B with leachate subsurface irrigation, three times that of Site A without leachate irrigation. When an additional soil containing lower contents of carbon and nitrogen was introduced to cover part of Site B, its N2O fluxes decreased by 1–2 orders of magnitude compared with the left area of Site B. This suggested that carefully selected cover soils could substantially reduce N2O emissions even under leachate subsurface irrigation. Statistical analysis proved that the availabilities of soil moisture and mineralized nitrogen were the key parameters controlling landfill N2O emissions.