Research Article Open Access

Chemical Characteristics of Leachate Contaminated Lateritic Soil

Abstract

Landfill leachate is generated from liquids existing in the waste as it enters a landfill or from rainwater that passes through the waste within the facility. Leachate can consist of many different organic and inorganic compounds that are typically either dissolved or suspended in the wastewater. High concentrations of chemical oxygen demand (COD) associated BOD, nitrogen, phenols, pesticides, solvents and heavy metals are common in these systems. Most of the MSW generated is disposed in low lying areas, which eventually become open dumps, located in the outskirts of the city. After few years of dumping, these waste dumping yards get filled up and need to be abandoned. Meantime with urban development and expansion, these areas (dumping yards) come under a zone with serious scarcity of vacant land. Therefore, this areas need to be reclaimed for other purposes. Behaviour of such land containing MSW and contaminated by leachate are still not well understood under various loading conditions and thus a gap exist for predicting the engineering behaviour of structures constructed of/width MSW fills. Large areas of land are currently being used for this study. A laboratory testing program was carried out to determine the properties of leachate contaminated soils. MSW samples and leachate contaminated soil samples are used in this study. Contaminated samples are prepared by mixing the soil with different concentration of contaminants by adding equivalent weight of molecular mass of contaminant in 1 liter of distilled water to get the particular concentration of normality (N). These contaminant solutions are then added to the soil samples at different concentrations (0.1 N through 1.0 N) and thoroughly mixed with it. The results show that the MSW samples and leachate contaminated specimen effects the chemical characteristics of the soil. The pH measurements of soil contaminated with leachate contaminated and MSW samples indicated an increase in pH values. This is also accompanied by slight increase in the cation exchange capacity of the soil. The change in chemical characteristics of lateritic soil contributed due to addition of leachate may be detrimental to foundation concrete in real field conditions. The present work deals with an attempt to study the effect of leachate on the chemical characteristics of soil.

Dr. Diganta Goswami, Bibeka Nanda Choudhury

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