A novel vegetated three-layer landfill cover system using recycled construction wastes without geomembrane

To promote environmental protection and sustainability, the use of plants and recycled wastes in geotechnical constructions such as landfill covers are recommended. A landfill cover field test was conducted at the Shenzhen Xiaping landfill site, located in a humid climatic region of China. The main objective is to validate the field performance of a novel vegetated three-layer landfill cover system using recycled construction waste without the need of geomembrane. Unsieved completely decomposed granite and coarsely crushed concrete was used for the top and intermediate layer while sieved completely decomposed granite was used as the lowest layer. One section was transplanted with Bermuda grass while the other section was left bare. To assess the landfill cover performance, pore water pressure, volumetric water content, percolation and atmospheric parameters were measured for a period of 13 months under natural climatic conditions. The cumulative rainfall depth was about 2950 mm over the whole monitoring period. During rainfall, the presence of grass led to lower pore water pressure (or higher suction) and volumetric water content in the three-layer landfill cover system. At the end of monitoring, the cumulative percolation was about 27 mm and 20 mm for the bare and grass covered landfill cover, respectively. It is evident that the vegetated three-layer landfill cover system using recycled concrete without geomembrane can be effective in minimizing percolation at humid climates.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author