A feasibility study of hydrogen sulfide as tracer in landfill gas monitoring

Abstract

Municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills are one of the major sources of offensive odours potentially creating annoyance in adjacent communities. Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) which reported to be one of the odourous gas (rotten egg). The formation of H2S contributed by sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) which can utilize dissolved sulfate as an electron acceptor through waste biodegradation. This project focuses on H2S emission from two landfills in Perlis, Malaysia to determine the applicability of H2S as non induced LFG monitoring tracer. Landfill gas (LFG) samples were collected and analyzed accordance with NIOSH method 6013 to prove H2S presence at abundance in term of concentration. The mean concentrations of H2S in Kuala Perlis Landfill and Padang Siding Landfill are 210.68 ppm and 242.85 ppm respectively. H2S concentration within landfill fluctuate due to several weather conditions, samples reveal H2S are more concentrated at higher temperature, high humidity, and low air pressure on odour transport from the landfill. H2S is an ideal gas tracer due to high background concentration, ease of detection by hand held analyzer, odourous properties, persistence toward environmental deterioration, compare other odourous organic gas that are abundance in landfill.