Waste Manage Res 2002: 20: 198210 Printed in UK all rights reserved

Copyright ISWA 2002

Waste Management & Research

ISSN 0734242X

Modelling for environmental assessment of municipal solid waste landfills (Part 1: Hydrology)
A three-dimensional dynamic simulation program for the prediction of leachate flows, their organic contamination and the gas generated in municipal waste landfills, (MODUELO) has been developed. It permits the simulation of canyon landfills in which the surface area changes throughout the landfills history and of complex drainage systems. The hydrologic module calculates, based on the saturated flow equations, the water flow between cells and the overall moisture balance. Its results allow the contamination module to carry out the balance of organic material. This paper presents the development of the hydrologic module. The contamination models are included in another paper. A preliminary application to the Meruelo Landfill (Spain) is also shown here. The fitting of a data series of leachate flows in Meruelo indicated the existence, in this particular landfill, of unconsidered phenomena. The final adjustment of the results makes it possible to obtain a reliable simulation of the degradation processes.

Amaya Lobo Garca de Cortzar Javier Herrero Lantarn Oscar Montero Fernndez Iaki Tejero Monzn
Environmental Engineering Group. University of Cantabria, Spain

Maria Fantelli Lamia

Empresa de Residuo de Cantabria, Spain Keywords Landfill, hydrologic module, leachate, contamination, mathematical modeling, dynamic simulation, municipal solid waste management, landfills history, wmr 4262

Corresponding author: Amaya Lobo Garcia de Cortzar, Grupo de Ingeniria Ambiental, Dpto. Ciencias y Tcnicas del Agua y del Medio Ambiente, E.T.S. Ingenieros Caminos, Canales y Puertos, c/Los Castros s/n, Santander 39005, Cantabria, Spain Received 14th July 2000, accepted in revised form 18th May 2001

Introduction
European policies have placed municipal solid waste (MSW) disposal in the last position among the existing management alternatives. Any kind of waste utilisation is preferred. Nevertheless, the exploitation and conservation of MSW landfills within environmentally safe conditions will be of interest for a long time to come. After the original waste utilisation (reuse, recycling, composting or energy recovering) a final residue is left that has to be disposed of in an appropriate way and this makes the landfills disappearance impossible. On all accounts, the closure of landfills does not imply their control and

management being forgotten. On the contrary, it is probably at this stage when tougher environmental safety measures must be implemented. The accumulation of municipal solid waste may cause important water, soil and air pollution during its degradation process. To prevent this, systems controlling run-off water and leachates are designed, as well as collection and management systems of the gas generated (which may or may not utilise it). These environmental protection systems were traditionally designed based on criteria dictated by accumulated experience and simplified models based on large-scale hydrological balances. They

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do not consider, for example, the study of the effect of the systems installed in the landfill during the different stages of activity since the beginning of their existence. Thanks to the widespread use of computers over the last 15 years, various landfill simulation programs have been created to evaluate alternatives to certain design elements such as drainage and gas collection systems, before being put into effect. An analysis of existing environmental simulation programs for landfills differentiates those centered on the management of leachates generated (El Fadel et al. 1997; Guyonnet et al. 1997) and those focused on the evaluation and harnessing of gas (Lee et al. 1993; Bogner et al. 1997). Different types of hydrological simulation landfill models, like HELP [Schroeder et al. 1994] or FILL [Khanbilvardi et al. 1995] or simplified models based on the direct method of water balance such as MOBYDEC [Guyonnet et al. 1998] do not include waste decomposition among the modelled processes. Therefore, they do not allow the estimation of the contamination dragged along by the infiltrated liquid. On the other hand, hydrologic modeling is very important in order to estimate the gas that is being emitted, as it facilitates the balance between the organic leachate material, its biological transformation into gas, and that which still forms part of the waste. Moreover, the waste water content conditions these degradation processes. Hydrologic simulation models that go beyond a simple water balancing since the local conditions are looked at in detail, do not study the influence of the landfills history in the simulated phenomena, which could have important effects on them (the water retention of the waste layers decreases upon increasing pressure, the liquid flow varies upon filling the landfill, etc). Only Andreottola et al. (1997) considers the effect of this phenomenon, and in only one dimension, by modeling a landfill divided into independent compartments. This paper presents the MODUELO simulation program, which has been created to evaluate the environmental effects of the landfill. Using climatological information, waste production and landfill layout data, it estimates the leachates produced throughout a given period as well as their organic contamination and the gas generated in the biodegrading process. The program reproduces the landfills history and incorporates an independent module for simulating different scenarios in waste management, which allows the study of the landfills

performance and its characteristics under different hypotheses, such as general urban waste management policies as well as landfill exploitation strategies. The simulations, once the model is calibrated, makes it possible to predict the leachate flow extracted by the drainage system, organic contamination and gas generated daily. The adopted models were inspired by works on the modelling of different landfill phenomena published by other authors (Demetracopoulos et al. 1986; Schroeder et al. 1994; Khanbilvardi et al. 1995; Guyonnet et al. 1997). The objective was not to elaborate specific process models, but to create a global program (including not only water quantity but also leachate quality and gas generation) for direct use in design and exploitation, using the existing bibliography and simplifying certain aspects. However, on occasions it was necessary to create new formulations considering phenomena which were not included in other works, such as in the case of the drain-ward flow and degradation models. On other occasions, existing models were simplified (for example, by limiting the depth to which the evaporation models were applied). MODUELO has been designed focusing particularly on landfills operated with the canyon/depression method, which are not easily modeled by the software available. In contrast with the trench and area method landfills, where the active surface can remain almost constant during the landfills life, the changes in the surface area as the wastes are being buried are very important in this type of fill. As the working surface rises its area usually increases, increasing not only the infiltration surface, but also the rain flows entering the waste mass. On the other hand, in depression landfills it is especially important to avoid the saturation of the waste layers in order to prevent landfill instabilities due to excessive stresses on the retaining wall. A common measure in rainy weather regions is to combine low-permeability daily cover materials, in order to reduce the amount of water reaching the wastes, with drainage systems that rapidly evacuate the water filtrated into the horizontal layers. Dendritic drainage networks placed on each daily cover are usually constructed with this purpose in mind. In some particular cases these networks are substituted/complemented by large vertical drain walls that are arranged throughout the height of the fill. These measures modify substantially not only the hydrologic performance of the landfill, but also the processes of gas migration within it. The type of landfill presented is very usual in Europe,
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Fig. 1. MODUELOS general calculation process

where accidented topography areas, which can hardly be utilised for other land uses, are used for final waste disposal. They cannot be correctly idealized as a vertical series of horizontal layers with the same area, as proposed by models like HELP Furthermore, a certain flexibility is . necessary in order to define the different drainage conditions. As a first application of the program, a calibration was made based on a series of recorded leachate flows in the Meruelo Landfill (Spain). Due to its special configuration, in which the three-dimensional effects and especially the horizontal flows towards a central drain are very significant, it is not possible to model this landfill adequately with the existing software. This has motivated the development of simplified models, based on the global hydrologic balance for the quantitative prediction of the leachate (Tejero et al. 1993). Even so, this kind of model does not provide information on the generated pollution, which is the final objective of Moduelo. The following paragraphs show the formulation adopted for the modeling of the hydrologic processes and the results of calibrating the program starting with the series of recorded flows in the Meruelo landfill. For reasons of length, the contamination module and its preliminary calibration will be presented in another paper.

climatological data) which are read at every time step, once the user has defined the dimensions of the discretization grid and the time unit length. The program has three main parts, each giving a certain type of result, which serves as data for the next part (Fig. 1). The calculation module, present landfill layout, establishes the cells that are active during the corresponding cycle and updates their properties (moisture, field capacity, substances dissolved in the water content, etc). The hydrologic module calculates the water flow between different cells. The user chooses the group of cells whose hydrological characteristics he wishes to record. These results are stored in a file at the end of the calculation. Using the moisture results obtained from the hydrological section for each cell, the contamination module obtains the organic material dissolved in the leachate, that which remains as part of the waste, and that which converts into gas. The cycle is completed by updating the time (t+t) and waste production data.
Waste generation module

Development of the model

General algorithm

Modeling was based on three-dimensional discretisation. Three types of defining data are necessary for the landfill (waste generation, geometric definition of the landfill and

The total annual weight, composition and characteristics of the waste that arrives at the landfill are obtained in MODUELO by a module that can be operated independently from the rest of the program and which is known as the waste generation module. This module calculates the annual progress of the quantities of waste produced, its composition and characteristics, from the following data that the user inputs: waste

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Table 1. Waste categories included in the program Main fields ORGANIC WASTES Paper Cardboard Food waste Yard waste Wood Cellulous materials Textiles Rubber and leather Plastics INORGANIC WASTES Glass Metals Tetrabrick Other inorganic/non combustible wastes Other wastes Secondary fields

White paper, newspaper, magazine, HMW* Corrugated, cardboard , dirty cardboard

Diapers, feminine napkins Rubber and leather PET, HDPE, PVC, LDPE, PP, PS, film, other plastics, HMW*

Clear, brown, green, other, HMW* Ferrous metals, aluminum, aluminum foil, aerosols, other non-ferrous metals, HMW*

* HMW* = hazardous municipal waste; PET = polystyrene terephalate; HDPE = high-density polyethylene; PVC = polyvinyl chloride; LDPE = low-density polyethylene; PP = polypropylene; PS = polystyrene.

flow composition in a given year (simple classification for main fields or complex classification for secondary fields [Table 1]), waste properties (moisture, landfill density and caloric power), production growth rates, recycling proportions, biodegradability and chemical composition. The variables that define waste properties and their generation rates can be defined in a global or individual manner for each component, according to the available data. Generation rates can vary with time (each year) or remain constant. The results of this module are stored in a database with independent access. This autonomous administration makes it possible to study the effect of different scenarios concerning minimisation and recycling policies of the waste arriving at the landfill and its characteristics without the need to operate all of the calculation modules.
Land configuration module

The landfill is simplified to a three-dimensional grid for calculation purposes, with constant horizontal dimensions and vertical dimensions varying from layer to layer. The program makes distinctions between two types of grids: that which is used to define the land, detailed according to available information and the calculus grid, defined in the program, which can be made coarser in order to reduce simulation time. Six cell types are defined in the grid:

1) Land Cell. An inactive impermeable cell that reflects land irregularities beneath the landfill cells, which are given by cartography and established discretisation. They do not intervene in the filling process nor do they interact with other cells; 2) Empty Cell. Cells which will never be filled. It permits free flow towards lower cells; 3) Landfill Cell. Formed by garbage that arrives and its corresponding cover soil. A fill order number is defined as a property of this cell, which permits the simulation of waste history input. It behaves as an Empty Cell until it is filled; 4) Cover Cell. It is similar to a landfill cell in that the parameters of the last covering layer (evapotranspiration) can be defined; 5) Soil Cell. Formed of only one material, different from garbage (it represents mounds, retaining walls, etc). As in the next case, the user can define two types of Soil Cells. They are considered to have null permeability which impedes not only water flow through it but also water infiltration (an aspect that must be taken into account because it reduces the surface exposed to infiltration). This hypothesis implies that the global model is not able to simulate the leakage through the base barrier layers which will be incorporated in later versions. In spite of this an orientative value of the volume of leachate migrating from the fill can be obtained by comWaste Management & Research

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paring the simulated global volumes with the measured ones. The difference between them would approximate the volume of leachate that is not being collected by the leachate system, and thus passing the barrier layers; and 6) Drain Cells. Similar to Soil Cells, they simulate the presence of important high-permeability gravel drainage fills, such as in the case of vertical drains. They transmit water to contiguous cells according to their defined permeabilities (vertical and horizontal). Within the same simulation, two types of Drain Cell, with different characteristics, can be defined. A placement order number is assigned to both the Soil Cells and Drain Cells. In this respect, they differ from landfill cells in that their placement is instantaneous (there is no waiting for enough garbage to fill the cell). Drain Cells have to be distinguished from the horizontal leachate collection system, which can be defined, within this model, in every waste layer (constituted by Landfill Cells). These horizontal drainage networks are constituted by drainage channels distributed in a dendritic pattern and formed by high-permeability granular material around drainage pipes that collect the flow diverted toward them.
Climatological module

Hydrological module

The hydrological module takes data, at each time interval, for the present landfill layout, precipitation and outside temperature. With this information it calculates for each cell the water that is transported to the contiguous cells or to the leachate collecting system according to the flow submodels, and updates its moisture. By means of a general water balance it later establishes the proportion of infiltrated rain and renews the moisture of the surface cells. This process is repeated at every time step.
General water balance

The water that enters each landfill cell comes from the outside (infiltration) or from contiguous cells (filtration). This liquid is stored in the form of moisture until it saturates the cells field capacity. From this point, the increase in moisture is transformed into free-flowing water. Water losses in the cell are produced by lateral or vertical filtration or by pore squeeze (reduction of the water retention due to overloading the cell). The equation that expresses the calculation of general water balance for each cell in MODUELO is:

LD(t+t) = P(t) + LPV(t) + LPL(t) SRO(t)

EVT(t) SCR(t) + PSW(t) [1] where LD(t+t) = leachate volume that is transported toward the contiguous cells in time t+t; P(t) = volume of precipitation on the cell (null in buried cells); LPV(t) and LPL(t) = volumes filtered vertically and laterally toward the cell, calculated as explained further on; SRO(t)= surface runoff; EVT(t) = volume of precipitation lost to evaporation (exploited areas) or evapotranspiration (finally covered areas); SCR(t) = remaining storage capacity, equal to the total capacity of liquid storage less the moisture of the cell in the previous step; PSW(t) = moisture released by pore squeezing (waste compacting). The volume of infiltrated water is calculated according to Hortons model (1933), for which different parameters (fc, f0 y k) are defined for the landfill cells (in exploitation) and covered landfill cells, taking into account that the closure of the landfill greatly reduces the precipitation infiltration rates. In order to calculate the evaporation produced in the last layers, two cases were incorporated: one with the water table near the surface (saturated landfill cell),

As the objective of the program is to evaluate the daily leachate flows, the necessary climatological data such as precipitation, temperature, insolation, mean wind speed and relative humidity is required. All of the values used in the model are mean daily values, except those for precipitation. In order to define the necessary approximation for the proportions of infiltrated and runoff rainwater it is important to have hourly rain intensity information. The simplification of the balance to the daily mean could lead to far-fetched results. The program allows the inputing of climatological data directly from the files edited by the corresponding meteorological station. The predictive study (design) projects future data from an introduced series, by using a copy of randomly chosen years. Often the hourly precipitation series recorded by the corresponding meteorological station are incomplete. MODUELO fills in the blanks of the series by adding zeros to dry periods or synthetic rain events, which are generated from the mean daily rainfall series and by making them proportional to the distribution of the precipitation in a metereological station near one which does have data.

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which is solved according to the combination method developed by Penman (1948) and the model for water scarcity for evaporation, according to Turc (1961). The evapotranspiration that occurs after covering the landfill with layers of vegetation is simulated using a simplified version of Thornthwaites model (1955). This model has been modified in order to prevent the deviations that could be produced upon applying it only to surface cells. The magnitude of the moisture evaporated would vary, in the same conditions, according to the size of the cell defined in the simulation, which conditions the storage capacity of the water available for evaporation. A fictitious parameter was introduced, known as the evaporation depth (hev), which represents the maximum depth which is affected by this event. When the potential evapotranspiration is greater than the water stored at that height, only the accumulated amount will evaporate (actual evapotranspiration). The results of this model are monthly values of evapotranspiration which are distributed daily in each surface cell. The general balance takes into account that the waste is able to store water and that this capacity can be modified in time. The water content of a cell subjected to water flow increases until reaching its field capacity (maximum water storage capacity), at which point the free flow of all the liquid is permitted. This capacity greatly depends on waste porosity which is at the same time conditioned by the pressure to which it is subjected. Only the variation of field capacity due to the weight of the upper cells is considered. The following equation was developed from the expressions of Huistric et al. (1980): CCi(t) = CCa (CCa CCb)/(1+ CCc/Wi(t)) [2]

flow (throughout the daily cover layer) being much more restrictive. In this type of landfill, the flow through the unsaturated zone, which is of great importance some circumstances, seems to lose importance; more so if we take into account the presence of less permeable layers that condition the vertical flow. On the other hand, studying the biological degradation processes requires knowledge of the moisture in all the cells, for which three-dimensional discretisation of the landfill is needed, as well as in order to simulate the landfills history. For these reasons a three-dimensional discretized model was created, based on the saturated flow equations that govern the movement of the fluid between all of the cell pairs that make up the landfill. It is important to notice that a model of the reduction of the permeability coefficients of the different layers with compaction should be developed. Here a mathematical expression of the variation of the coefficients has not yet been incorporated. In order to correct the errors in simulations with long time steps, the flows are limited in such a way that they do not lead to water content values in the cells passing saturation or lowering field capacity. The calculation process of this model begins with obtaining the horizontal flows between contiguous cells. Later, the vertical flow and the flow produced in the drains are calculated and the terms of general water balance are evaluated. The moisture content for each cell is updated after each one of these operations.
Horizontal flow submodel

where CCi(t) = field capacity of cell i in moment t; CCa = initial field capacity; CCb = minimum field capacity, corresponding to the infinite pressure on the cell; CCc = parameter that defines the field capacity variation with the pressure on the waste; Wi = weight on cell i per unit area in moment t.
Transport model

Darcys hypotheses of flow in a porous medium was assumed. The horizontal flow was modelled using the discretized Boussinesq equation (supposing stationary flow for each time step): Kh

h (h l sen) l l

+R=0

[3]

As observed above, MODUELO was originally conceived as a tool for simulating canyon landfills located in humid climate regions, where the configuration of the drainage system facilitates a rapid horizontal evacuation of the water from the waste layers, the conditions for the vertical

where Kh = saturated horizontal permeability; l = distance travelled towards the bottom (inclined with respect to the horizontal plane); = slope of the cell bottom; R = vertical recharge. h = height of water corresponding to drainable moisture. For the iterative calculations in the nodes of the horizontal grid, the modeling sequence assimilates the transWaste Management & Research

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port of the fluid between cells to that which would be produced between two deposits with water heights equal to the moisture of the cell corresponding to moment t. The horizontal flow between contiguous cells 1 and 2, Q12, is idealized by isolating both from the environment. Then, according to the previous equation: Q12 (t+t) = Khe . Ax(t) . [h2(t) h1(t) Lx . tan]/Rh] [4] where Khe = 2 . K1 . K2 / ( K1 + K2 ), permeability equivalent to the set of cells 1 and 2, with K1 and K2 being their respective permeability values; Ax(t) = [ h2(t) h1+(t) ] / 2. Ly, the transversal area to the flow, where Ly is the dimension of the cells perpendicular to the considered flow; h2(t) and h1(t) are the free water heights of cells 2 and 1, respectively, which are assumed to be concentrated in the saturated area; Lx is the cell dimension in the flow direction projected in the horizontal plane; tan is the value of the tangent of the layers slope; Rh = radius of horizontal influence, a parameter that represents the transition length between h1 and h2, which is introduced to calibrate the horizontal flow. In the flow between a cell and its empty exterior, this last parameter has been substituted by another, called horizontal influence ratio in frontward flow, with no alteration to the rest of the model.
Vertical flow submodel

For the first hypothesis to be applicable it is enough that the permeability of the cover be one order of magnitude less than that of the waste. If this was not the case a landfill cell without cover can be defined. When the cover layer does not exist (uncovered waste or Soil Cells or Drain Cells), the flow is assumed to be Darcian with a hydraulic unit gradient through land with a permeability equivalent to Kv = 2 K1v . K2v / (K1v + K2v), with K1v and K2v being the vertical permeability values of the implied cells.
Drain flow submodel

The vertical flow Qv (t+t) between cells separated by a cover layer in the lower cell with thickness e and permeability Kv is: Qv(t+t) = Az . Kv . ( h1(t) + e ) / e [5]

The Drain Flow Submodel is applied to those Landfill Cells where a horizontal drainage network has been defined earlier. The parameters needed for their simulation are the slope of the bottom of the layer to the tiles, the collection pipes slope and the value of the unit drainage area for the cells, which would represent the transversal section area of the pipe crossing each cell. The user can also specify a value for the hydraulic conductivity of a lowpermeability barrier layer when the drainage system is placed over other Landfill Cells. It is interpreted as the vertical permeability Kv of the lower cell cover. Percolation through liner soil layers and leakage through geomembranes have not yet been included in this first version of the program. So it is assumed that the bottom layers are completely impermeable and, because of this, all the water infiltrating the upper layers reaches the leachate collection pipes. The flow inside the cells where the drainage system is included toward the gravel layer is similar to the vertical flow within uncovered cells, so that the leachate collected by the pipe in a cell, Qd, is expressed as a function of a decrease in the hydraulic head in the same h(t) according to [6]. Qd = h . Az / t [6]

where Az = horizontal area of the cells, Lx . Ly; h1(t) = moisture of the upper cell in the moment t. The main hypotheses adopted for the model were: The water is considered to flow freely through the waste layer, given that its permeability is greater than that of the cover and that a great amount of the flow passes through preferential routes (Guyonnet et al. 1998); Liquid is neither stored nor released in the cover layer, which remains saturated; and The flow through the cover layer is Darcian.

The flow is limited by the resistence to the liquid flow in the cell [7] and the restriction via the function of the full drain pipe when it is saturated, as expressed by Mannings formula. [7] Qd = Az . Kvd where Az = horizontal area of the cell; Kvd = vertical permeability of the drain, a parameter that takes into account the deceleration produced in the theoretical

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vertical flow by curvature of the flow toward the drain pipe. The gravel layer is not supposed to impose any restriction on the flow (it is infinitely permeable).

Preliminary calibration of the hydrologic submodel

Introduction

In the following paragraphs a first application of the program to a real landfill is presented. This application does not intend to be a calibration proper of the model, which is not possible due to the characteristics of the available data, which consist of an incomplete series of discrete (non-continuous) measures. The objective was for it to be a first approximation to the performance of the model in simulating the hydrologic and degradation processes (Lobo et al. 2000) in landfills of the type described above. As is observed in Fig. 5 the field data which the preliminary calibration is based on consist of a series of discrete measures of the leachate flow in the final collection pipe.
The Meruelo landfill

Fig. 2. Scheme of the Meruelo landfill layout

The first operation stage of the Meruelo landfill, whose simulation is presented here, was inaugurated on December, 1988 to receive the municipal solid waste generated in central and eastern Cantabria. It was in operation for two years until its closing in December, 1990. Meruelo is a depression landfill, located in the lowest part of a valley. The waste was accumulated behind small rest-balks with a height of 2.5 m, forming layers of 50 cm of thickness with low-permeability daily cover of 20 cm. The original closing slope was interrupted by three bermes of about 20 m to ensure stability, which provoked the change of the hydrologic active area throughout the landfills life. The main characteristic of its layout is the presence of a central quarrystone drain (see Fig. 2) which is connected all along the height of the landfill. It totally conditions the leachate regime by rapidly evacuating the water present in the waste layers. It also acts as an important passive venting element for the gas. The leachate are finally collected by the horizontal drainage system located at the bottom of the landfills base (Fig. 2) which conducts it to the leachate well where it is pumped to the treatment plant. Calibration is based on data from 1989 and 1990, years in which 90,450 and 111,650 tons of waste with known composition and characteristics (Grupo de Residuos 1992) were collected respectively. Cartography, operation infor-

mation (quantity of waste received and its composition), climatological conditions and a record of the leachates (discrete flow and contamination data) produced during the period of 1/03/90 to 15/10/90 [Fantelli 1990; Grupo de Residuos 1992] were available from this landfill. No further data on this area of the fill corresponding to the first stage could be obtained because of the operation, from January 1991, of the second stage of the landfill, whose leachate system was directly connected to the existing one. It has made it impossible to monitor the changes of the waste in this first part once it was closed.
Calibration process

The calibration process for the model begins with inputting data for simulations: quantities and characteristics of the waste dumped in the period to be simulated, geometric definition of the landfill and the climatological information. It is essential that the present landfill configuration module work with the most reliable volume and filling order data possible, so that the infiltration areas are as close as possible to the real ones at any given time. On the contrary, it is difficult to adjust the hydrological model: the calculated volume of liquid leachate is very different, etc. Calibation starts with the hydrological model. By using preliminary simulations that do not need much precision, Hortons model of infiltration (parameters f0, fc and k) can be calibrated, by adjusting the monthly or annual balances of measured leachates. Later, the registered leachate-time curve (maximum flow, delay time at the peak, leachate duration) is fitted. In this case the parameters to be modified are the permeability values (Kv y Kh) and drainage values (Kvd) and horizontal flow (Rh, Rhf ) models. This
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* Different from the horizontal drainage network, defined in the bottom landfill cells layer Fig. 3. Window of the Landfill Configuration Module of the Meruelo Landfill model in MODUELO: plan and profiles. (The profile on the right shows the model of the central drain)

preliminary fitting should be carried out starting with the landfills response to a rain concentrated in time (unit hydrograph), so that later it can be better calibrated with the time series that is available. Once the infiltration and moisture in the cells are adjusted in time, the degradation model is calibrated, to fit the gas volumes that are recorded or the organic contamination measured in the leachate. The preliminary hydrologic calibration of the model of Meruelo was carried out by adjusting the leachate curve produced by a concentrated, isolated rain (117 mm m2
Table 2. Hydrologic parameters adopted for Meruelo after preliminary calibration Parameter Kh (m/s) Kv (m/s) Kvd (m/s) n Manning Rh (m) Rhf (m) Adopted value 0,01 0,000002 0,001 0,013 1 1

over a six-day period) on a synthetic landfill (called TEST 1) with characteristics similar to those of the studied landfill. TEST 1 occupied a total volume of 46,687.5 m3 with 63,101.3 Tn of solid waste distributed in six layers with a thickness of 2.3 m and with a soil cover of 20 cm with sufficient bottom drain capacity. It was discretized in a total of 83 cells (including containing mounds) with horizontal dimensions of 15 x 15 m. The variation in the volume of infiltrated rain and leachate in time was observed in each simulation, with varying parameter values until the expected curves were obtained. The models sensitivity to different parameters was studied, proving that the horizontal influence ratio and the vertical permeability of the drain only conditioned the flow when it was not limited by other factors. Rh becomes important when the horizontal flow conditions the cell-to-cell leachate transport, while Kvd only changes the result considerably when Kv and Kh are too elevated. At the same time, the hydrogram variation was quantified (by means of peak flow values) upon modify-

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Fig. 4. Precipitation, infiltration and leachate curves recorded in "TEST 1" for the hydrologic parameters adopted

Fig. 5. Precipitation, infiltration and leachate curves recorded in "SIM 1"

ing the permeability values (Fig. 4). The infiltration and leachate curves arrived at are shown in Fig. 5.

Results
Simulations for the whole landfill were carried out from 1/12/1988, when it was inaugurated, to 15/10/1990, the date when the measuring campaign finished. In the first simulations, using values found in the literature for the several parameters of the model

(Tchobanoglous et al. 1993; Manassero et al. 1997), a background leachate flow (continuous flow between rain events) was detected that was much greater than the measured flow data. The adopted field capacity model provoked a peak in the leachate when a new cell was placed, as a consequence of the instantaneous loss of water retention capacity of the cells undergoing greater pressure. In reality the process is more prolonged over time, but if the placement rhythm of the cells is continuous enough, the points overlap day after
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day, originating what we have called background flow. The parameters proposed in the bibliography (CCb = 5% and CCc = 10,000 kg m2) give rise to a decrease in the original field capacity with a very pronounced depth (in our simulation the water retention capacity of a layer buried beneath two others was less than 30%). Values of 30% and 30,000 kg m2 were adopted for CCb and CCc respectively. But the most important reason for the simulated background leachate to be so above the measures has been found to be the surface hydraulic processes in the landfill. MODUELO does not take into account the possible incorporation of runoff over the surface layer into the fill. With Hortons model it calculates the infiltrated fraction of the rain, without considering the water that can accumulate and move on the surface and filtrate the layer later or in other locations. And this was crucial in the leachates produced in Meruelo during the first operation stage (Meruelo I landfill). As has been described the principal element of the drainage system was the central drainage wall. It acted as a collection pipe for all the horizontal layers of waste and also for part of the surface runoff, which was directed towards it by the imposed slopes of the low-permeability cover layers. As a result the flows corresponding to each rain event were much higher and faster (they remained less time than expected), the background flow being lower than expected. In order to simulate this fact with MODUELO the horizontal permeability parameters had to be increased to out-of-real-rank values (Table
Table 4. List of parameters and constants of the hydrologic model Parameter vertical flow model drain model horizontal flow model Kv(1) (m s-1) Kvd(2) (m s-1) n Manning(2) Kh(1) (m s-1) Rh(2) (m) Rhf(2) (m) infiltration model (horton) absorption model fc(1) (mm h-1) f0(1) (mm h-1) k Hor(1) (min-1) CCa(1) (%) CCb(2) (%) CCc(2) (Kg m-2) Hhyg(2) (%) hevap(2) (m) Hsat(1) (%) Dcov.(1) (T m-3)

Table 3. Hydrologic parameters adopted for Meruelo (TEST 1) Landfill cell Closed landfill cell Drain cell Soil cell

fc Horton (mm/h) f0 Horton (mm/h) k Horton (min-1) CCa (%) CCb (%) CCc (T/m2) Hsaturation (%) Kh (m/s) Kv (m/s) Cover density (T/m3) * Density of cell material

3 30 1,4 47 30 30 70 0.01 0.000002 1.4

3 15 1.4 47 10 70 50 0.01 0.01 0.0000001 0.01 1.4 2.1*

20 20 0 0 1.8*

3). They attempt to represent the effect of the surface runoff introduced into the central drain by evacuating the inside water much faster and thereby increasing the infiltration (avoiding its limitation) of the rain. Furthermore, the effect of the adopted hypothesis concerning the cover materials non-storage of moisture can be significant. In landfills like the one studied in which the cover/waste proportion is elevated (2/5), this assumption could considerably alter the landfills actual retention capacity. This effect could be prevented in the program by defining uncovered waste cells among layers of soil material, but then the model becomes quite complicated. In order to correct these deviations the values of CCb and

Description Vertical permeability of the cell Vertical permeability over the drain Manning friction factor of the drain Horizontal permeability of the cell Influence ratio of horizontal flow Influence ratio of horizontal flow per front Minimum infiltration rate Maximum infiltration rate, at start of precipitation Infiltration rate variation in time Maximum field capacity Minimum field capacity (at infinite pressure) Supported weight influence in the field capacity Hygroscopic moisture Evaporation depth (limit) Saturation moisture Cover material density

evaporation moel various models

(1) (2)

Characteristics of each cell type General Model Parameters

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Modelling for environmental assessment of municipal solid waste landfills (Part 1: Hydrology)

Table 5. Main characteristics and their application field of MODUELO characteristic 3-d discretization permits the simulation of Canyon/depression type landfills Landfill history Complex drainage systems (drainage networks on intermediate cover layers, draining walls) Low-permeability (below waste layers permeabilities) intermediate cover Surface area varying during operation time Degradation processes

possible leakages through the liner or the corresponding containing base material will be included in forthcoming versions of the program, thus allowing a more accurate simulation of these phenomena.

Conclusions
MODUELO, the principal applications of which have been summed up in Table 5, is meant to be a tool for the design and monitoring of municipal solid waste landfills and in particular the leachate protection, collection, transport and treatment systems, as well as for the exploitation or elimination of gas. It simulates the flow and organic composition of leachates and gas generated in landfills where a daily cover with a permeability lower than that of the waste layers is used. This version of the program has been developed based on canyon/depression landfills, particularly those located in humid regions, but it is also applicable to landfills operated with other methods (i.e. area or trench landfills), provided they fulfill the principal condition mentioned above. MODUELO facilitates the accuracy of the hydrologic and degradation simulation results by contemplating the variation of the waste production and management scenarios, as well as the landfill history. In order to consider the latter and different configurations of the drainage system, a three-dimensional model was chosen. It makes it possible to simulate the changes in the landfill surface area as well as in the nature of the waste deposited in each cell for each time period. This paper presents the hydrologic simulation module, in which saturated flow stationary state differential equations are solved for each time step. Once calibrations were carried out, the model was able to approximate the leachate flow series recorded by the drainage system. The data fitting in the particular case of Meruelo I sanitary landfill led to parameter values (horizontal permeabilities) that do not correspond to actual field values, revealing the existence of an important quantity of surface runoff reaching the leachate system in this case. The phenomena of surface runoff will be incorporated in the program, as it can also be significant in other cases. In another paper the simulation of a general pollutograph associated with the leachate flows shown here and that of the gas generated in this period will be presented.

saturated flow equations

landfill history simulation

CCc in the adopted field capacity reduction model were modified according to local conditions in this case. The influence of the discretization size was also studied. Two simulations were carried out with different cell sizes (10x10 m cells in SIM1 and 14 x 14 m cells in SIM2), maintaining the vertical dimension (1.9 m of waste thickness with 0.6 m of low-permeability cover material for each cell). The horizontal flow was slightly augmented by the increase of the surface dimensions of each cell, which supports keeping a fixed horizontal/vertical dimension relation (around 1/4). This influence is significant in the Meruelo case due to the important role of the horizontal flows. With the final fitted values for the program parameters (Table 4), the result shown in Fig. 5 was obtained. Instantaneous leachate flow data are fitted with an accuracy that makes it possible to conduct a study of the contamination produced by the degradation of the waste in the landfill throughout the time (Lobo et al. 2000), which is the principal objective of the program. A total recorded leachate volume value of 6233 m3 was obtained for the period of the measuring campaign by interpolating the available discrete flow values to obtain a flow value for each day of that period and integrating the resulting curve. Integrating the simulated result in the same period leads to an accumulated volume of 8371 m3 which deviates the first value by 30%. The comparison in this case is only illustrative as the available data do not permit the calculation of a reliable total volume. In a general case, where the data series allow a trustworthy global value to be established, this analysis could permit the determination of the volume of leachate that has migrated through the landfill barrier during the studied period. This would facilitate the monitoring of the liner system condition. However, the

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References
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