INGENIEUR
and conveyance of leachate to the Leachate
Treatment Plant (LTP). Monitoring wells are
installed around the landfill to monitor and
preclude any leakage and contamination to the
groundwater.
BTSL has essential infrastructures such
as access road, road signages, smart-card
operated weighbridge stations, trucks washtrough, perimeter security, etc., to ensure optimal
operations at the landfill.
Landfill Operations
Wastes are discharged at designated tipping areas
in active cells. Bulldozers spread the wastes over
the tipping front which is kept within a relatively
small area. The active cells are covered with a
membrane liner or earth layer on a daily basis to
minimise odour and reduce rainfall infiltration into
the waste layers.
The clean surface run-off collected from the
covered area is separately diverted away from
the open landfill cell into open watercourses, silt
traps and detention ponds, reducing the amount
of wastewater generated.
Leachate Treatment Plant (LTP)
Leachate is collected from the base of the
landfill cell and transferred to the state-of-theart Leachate Treatment Plant for treatment. With
180,000m3 storage capacity, BTSL has one of the
largest leachate storage capacity in the region,
providing a fail-safe system against any eventuality
of excess leachate production.
Physical, biological and chemical treatment
processes are operational around the clock and
actively monitored in real time by the SCADA
system. The LTP is capable of treating 1,200m3
of leachate a day. Leachate production, storage
and treatment rates are closely monitored to
ensure current and future storage and treatment
requirements.
BTSL adopts the unique Reed Beds technology
where treated leachate is further polished to
remove heavy metals using phragmitis plants.
BTSL adopts a ‘Zero Discharge’ policy
where treated effluent achieving standards
allowing discharge into open water-courses is
not discharged. Instead, the treated effluent is
irrigated over a 120-acre irrigation zone to ensure
maximum protection to the environment.
6
18
VOL
– DECEMBER 2015
VOL64
55OCTOBER
JUNE 2013
Daily, weekly and fortnightly tests are carried
out to obtain different parameters of both raw
and treated leachate. Additionally, independent
consultants and laboratories are engaged to
carry out extensive environmental monitoring
and the reports submitted to the Department of
Environment (DOE).
GENERATING GREEN ENERGY
The landfill gas collection and utilisation system is
an integral part of BTSL’s day-to-day operations.
A comprehensive landfill gas management
system harnesses the greenhouse gas (including
methane) resulting from decomposition of waste
to power its waste-to-energy plant.
Green house gas is effectively captured and
channelled to the Renewable Energy Management
Centre to be used as fuel to run the 4.4 MW gas
engines producing green energy for the National
Grid. This will be upgraded to a total of 6.4 MW
production by the end of 2015 when an additional
gas power engine is added to the existing three
engines.
BTSL has the distinction of operating the
largest grid-connected biogas renewable energy
facility under the Feed-in Tariff (FiT) programme
in Malaysia.
In its effort to reduce the carbon footprint,
BTSL has in excess of 1,000,000 Certified
Emission Reduction (CERs or carbon credits)
issued by the executive committee of the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change (UNFCCC) under the Clean Development
Mechanism (CDM). This is one of the largest
number of CERs issued to a landfill project in
South East Asia.
INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGIES
BTSL has achieved many firsts in landfill
technologies and operations, namely:1. The first and only sanitary landfill in the
country with a full-fledged 500m buffer
zone.
2. The largest fully-automated leachate
treatment plant in the country and in
South East Asia, capable of treating
1,200m3 of leachate per day.