Proposed procedure for the environmental life cycle assessment of sanitary landfill sites

Abstract

Landfills currently constitute a viable alternative for waste management, however, most of those qualified as such do not meet the required technical specifications, which has generated impacts to the environment, and is of international concern. Environmental assessment is a protection tool that responds to this problem and emerged at the end of the 1960's. It is assumed as an instrument and methodology for the execution of environmental studies, according to the use of a scale of parameters or indicators, which are not incorporated to landfills. For this reason, based on the use of a set of theoretical, empirical and statistical research methods, a procedure is designed for the environmental evaluation of the life cycle of these facilities, from the coherent integration of environmental indicators of the German regulations for final disposal sites and the Cuban Norm NC 135:2002, which allows timely decision making. The proposal contemplated in this article is based on a series of theoretical-methodological conceptions from environmental, institutional, participatory, legal and economic dimensions, which makes it possible to have an evaluation tool. This proposal is made up of three phases and eight steps to organize the situation/inventory, carry out the evaluation after defining the indicators, specify the activities and impact categories, and interpret the results. This proposed procedure offers a proposal for actions in the construction and operation methods, or for the closure, sealing and reinsertion of the infrastructure to minimize the effects on the natural and socioeconomic systems.