Impact assessment of a solid waste dump site on it host environment: Particulate Matter

Burning of solid waste openly has contributed greatly to the degradation of ambient air quality, thus having a harmful effect on environment, animals, materials and human. This study employs a mass-based solid waste characterization method and also looks at the parameter such as ash content of the solid waste. Met One GT 331 mass monitor was employed to assess the levels of particulate matter and Total suspended particles (TSP) at ten sampling points on a dumpsite when the solid wastes were combusted. The study characterized 35.151 kg of solid waste with food waste, nylon, plastic, metals, paper and textile contributing to the major components in the study area with 23.46%, 27.64%, 7.30%, 3.29%, 24.32%, and 13.98% respectively. The percentage ash content was 7.12%, 7.09%, 21.41%, 29.16%, 8.88% and 7.58% respectively for food waste, nylon, plastic, paper, textile and composite waste. The 24 hr extrapolated concentrations for PM2.5, PM10 and TSP were ranged 1.97 –23.48 µg/m³, 12.70 –796.62 µg/m³ and 17.38 - 882.27 µg/m³ respectively. The extrapolated concentration for TSP breach the standard limit by FEPA for two days of the study.

I. INTRODUCTION

Open burning of solid waste in a dumpsite is a large source of air pollutants which is of hug concern to quality of air (Angaye and Abowei, 2018). Open burning is harmful to human health and environment. The solid waste burnt is released and in its raw form into the atmosphere, they pose not only a great danger to the environmental but also become a health concern for life (Weli , 2014). The effects of open burning can lead to breathing difficulties, eye irritation, threat to normal functioning of liver, kidney, heart and lungs of humans (Peter , 2018). Open burning is a daily activity that kills the environment. The adverse effects of pollutants are largely dependent on its concentration and exposure rate (Barakat-Haddad , 2015). Literature review on air quality around solid waste dumpsite in Nigeria showed values higher than the standard limit by the Federal Ministry of Environment (FMEnv) (Tariwari and Jasper, 2017). This is largely attributed to the unsafe management of waste including open air burning of waste. Air pollution associated with solid waste has become a major source of greenhouse gases emission including particulate matter during the open air burning (EZEKWE et al., 2016). Suspended Particulate matter released during burning of waste contain anthropogenic substance that causes irritation to naval cavity and causes infections. Several studies have confirmed the consistent relationship between mortality and PM exposure (Angaye and Abowei, 2018). Exposure to airborne particulate matter is of increasing concern to the general public and its assessment is necessary from time to time (Power , 2018; Uba, 2015). Exposure to high concentrations of PM₁₀, PM_2.5 particles can cause health related problems in humans for both short and long term (Chen , 2018). WHO (2014) attributed more than 7 million deaths due to exposure to PM both in indoor and outdoor. The ratio of PM_2.5/PM₁₀ is very crucial and important to identify emission sources of PM. High ratio of PM_2.5/PM₁₀ shows that fine particles dominates while low ratio value indicates domination of coarse particles. Meteorological parameters such as temperature and relative humidity affect the movement of air contaminants (Karagulian , 2015) . These parameters are directly or inversely related with the concentration of air pollutants (Zhou , 2018). Wu (2014) established that meteorological parameters have great effect on movement of PM as well as the concentration levels.