Coastal landfills and rising sea levels: A challenge for the 21st century

Nicholls, Robert J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9715-1109, Beaven, Richard P., Stringfellow, Anne, Monfort, Daniel, Le Cozannet, Gonéri, Wahl, Thomas, Gebert, Julia, Wadey, Matthew, Arns, Arne, Spencer, Kate L., Reinhart, Debra, Heimovaara, Timo, Santos, Victor M., Enríquez, Alejandra R. and Cope, Samantha (2021) Coastal landfills and rising sea levels: A challenge for the 21st century. Frontiers in Marine Science, 8. ISSN 2296-7745

Preview	PDF (Accepted_Manuscript) - Accepted Version Download (1MB) | Preview
Preview	PDF (fmars-08-710342) - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (4MB) | Preview

Abstract

Populated coastal areas worldwide have a legacy of numerous solid waste disposal sites. At the same time, mean sea level is rising and likely to accelerate, increasing flooding and/or erosion. There is therefore concern that landfill sites located at and near the coast pose a growing risk to the environment from the potential release of liquid and solid waste materials. This paper aims to assess our present understanding of this issue as well as research and practice needs by synthesizing the available evidence across a set of developed country cases, comprising England, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States (Florida). Common insights gained here include: (1) a lack of data and limited appreciation of waste release from coastal landfill as a potential problem; (2) recognition of the scale and diversity of coastal landfill waste within a range of generic settings (or situations); and (3) a lack of robust protocols that allow the impact of different categories of waste release to the coast to be assessed in a consistent and evidence-based manner, most particularly for solid waste. Hence, a need for greater understanding of the following issues is identified: (1) the amount, character and impact of waste that could be released from landfill sites; (2) the acceptability and regulation of waste eroding from coastal landfills; (3) present and future erosion rates at landfill sites suggesting the need for more monitoring and relevant predictive tools; (4) the full range of possible management methods for dealing with waste release from landfills and the science to support them; and (5) relevant long-term funding mechanisms to address this issue. The main focus and experience of current management practice has been protection/retention, or removal of landfills, with limited consideration of other feasible solutions and how they might be facilitated. Approaches to assess and address solid waste release to the marine/coastal environment represent a particular gap. Lastly, as solid waste will persist indefinitely and sea levels will rise for many centuries, the long timescale of this issue needs wider appreciation and should be included in coastal and waste policy.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	erosion,flood,landfill,sea-level rise,waste,oceanography,global and planetary change,aquatic science,water science and technology,environmental science (miscellaneous),ocean engineering ,/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/1900/1910
Faculty \ School:	University of East Anglia Research Groups/Centres > Theme - ClimateUEA
UEA Research Groups:	University of East Anglia Schools > Faculty of Science > Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research Faculty of Science > Research Centres > Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Collaborative Centre for Sustainable Use of the Seas
Related URLs:	http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?...
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	02 Sep 2021 00:18
Last Modified:	23 Oct 2022 02:57
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/81278
DOI:	10.3389/fmars.2021.710342

Downloads

Actions (login required)

View Item