Landfill Leachate Production Through Empirical Methodologies: A case study of the Lajes Site in Northeastern Brazil

The estimate of the amount of leachate is required in designing a landfill project as a measure of environmental protection. The flow of leachates to be drained serves as the basis for the design of the drainage system and of the storage tank for the collected leachate, and assists in choosing an appropriate treatment system for the volume of leachate and, also, in determining the settling time of the landfill after closure. In this sense, this work presents a study of leachate production from a landfill through empirical methodologies, namely: Swiss method, Rational method and Water Balance method. The results obtained showed the following: the Rational and Water Balance methods indicated production of leachate only for the months of water surplus; the Swiss method showed leachate generation throughout the year, even in the months of water deficit; regarding the estimated amount of leachate, the values obtained by the Water Balance method were higher than those obtained by the Rational method, these in turn were higher than those estimated by the Swiss method.