Description
Routine walking surveys have long been the regulatory standard for landfill methane monitoring, but questions about their reliability and the performance of emerging alternatives have gone largely unanswered. This research addresses that gap directly.
Through the SIMFLEX-Landfill (SIMFLEX-LF) controlled release evaluation program from the FluxLab at St. Francis Xavier University, EREF has systematically tested a wide range of methane measurement technologies under realistic landfill conditions across four field campaigns. The work includes drones, fixed sensor networks, truck tracer correlation, aircraft, and satellite-based systems, assessed side by side against conventional surface emissions monitoring (SEM).
The findings show that several modern approaches can outperform walking surveys for detecting emission sources, locating gas collection system deficiencies, and quantifying site-scale methane. Performance differences among technologies are driven less by hardware than by deployment strategy, data processing, and quality assurance practices. The research also demonstrates that field-based testing accelerates real-world improvement: multiple technology providers refined their methods following controlled-release feedback, achieving measurable gains in accuracy and consistency.
For landfill operators and waste company sustainability teams, this work provides an evidence-based foundation for evaluating monitoring programs as methane quantification becomes increasingly central to GHG reporting, regulatory compliance, and RNG project development.
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