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Identifying flood-prone landfills at different spatial scales

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Abstract

Landfills are mainly located in lowland areas close to settlements inducing flood risk of potential environmental contamination and adverse health effects. During recent flood events, numerous landfill sites were reportedly exposed to inundations, leading to erosion of landfilled material and release of pollutants threatening humans and the environment. Although emissions from landfills under regular operating conditions are well investigated, the behaviour and associated emissions in case of flooding are widely unknown. To enable environmental risk management, flood-prone landfills must be identified to establish priorities for subsequent protection and mitigation measures. This paper presents two flood risk assessment approaches at different spatial scales: a macro-scale assessment approach (MaSA) and a micro-scale assessment approach (MiSA). Both methodologies aim to determine the proportion of landfills endangered by flooding, and evaluate the impacts. The latter are expressed by means of risk categories (minor to serious) of impacts that flooded sites might have on humans and the environment. The evaluation of 1,064 landfills in Austria based on MaSA yields roughly 30 % of landfills located within or close to flood risk zones. Material inventories of 147 sites exposed to flooding are established, and potential emissions during a flood event are estimated. Three representative case study areas are selected and investigated in detail by applying the MiSA approach based on 2D hydrodynamic models to calculate flow depths and shear stress and by developing emission scenarios to validate the macro-scale screening approach (MaSA). The applications of MiSA and MaSA outlines that hazardous emissions due to flooding can lead to significant impacts on the environment. Uncertainty associated with related processes and data sources is considerably high. Nevertheless, both MiSA and MaSA provide a decision support tool to identify landfills with imminent risk for humans and the environment. Therefore, the described methodologies provide toolsets to enable environmental risk reduction by applying a priority-ranked flood risk management.

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Acknowledgments

The author wishes to express his gratitude to the federal governments of Salzburg and Tirol for providing the model set-ups for case study 2 and case study 3. This project was funded by the Federal Ministry of Transport, Innovation and Technology within the framework of the KIRAS Safety Research Program. Additional support was provided by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management.

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  1. Institute of Water Management, Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineering, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Muthgasse 18, 1190, Vienna, Austria

    C. Neuhold

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Correspondence to C. Neuhold.

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This article has previously been published as February 2013, Volume 65, 1 Issue 3, pp 2015-2030. DOI 10.1007/s11069-012-0459-z.

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Neuhold, C. Identifying flood-prone landfills at different spatial scales. Nat Hazards 68, 1425–1440 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-013-0562-9

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