EPA Mobile Monitoring Vehicle Samples Landfill Emissions in Neighborhoods
Northville - November 1
The Conservancy Initiative recently learned the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE) has been working with the USEPA National Enforcement Investigations Center (NEIC) to study air emssions from the landfill.
Last week (10/22 - 10/25) a team from NEIC brought a mobile monitoring vehicle to sample air emssions in and around the landfill. The EPA has successfully used this technology to identify and quantify specific emission sources at other problematic sites and negotiate emission reductions. The technology combines mobile sampling/analysis with weather data to model emission sources and produce polar plots of the emission plume. If you are interested, take a look at these links for additional information related to GMAP Field Monitoring. NEIC Advanced Monitoring - GMAP Fact Sheet (PDF) / Field Use of Air Monitoring Technologies (PDF) or google NEIC GMAP.
Crew from USEPA and EGLE inspecting mobile monitoring vehicle. This vehicle is equipped with analyzers for methane; total volatile organics compounds (VOCs); H2S; and meteorological and global positioning (GPS) equipment.
Although the weather was less than ideal last week, with high winds and rain at the beginning of the week, and there were some technical issues with the equipment, the GMAP crew was able to successfully conduct sampling at the landfill, around the landfill perimeter and in some of the neighborhoods that were experiencing odor problems. The sampling crew verbally reported odors and methane where detected while sampling in the neighborhoods, but it is going to take a while before the data can be processed into a report.
The expectation is that the EPA mobile sampling data will provide data to reinforce the odor complaints which were submitted last week. Data collected including maps generated of the odor/emission plume from the landfill should support EGLE’s efforts to drive compliance at the landfill.
Even though there is no data to report at this time, we wanted to share this information as just one example of the on-going efforts to improve conditions downwind of the landfill. Although we do not have a projected completion date for a final report, we are confident EGLE staff will publish the final report from the mobile sampling team as soon as they receive it.