Abstract
Groundwater contamination through leachates migration in landfills is one of the main concerns in this kind of disposal sites. To control this migration, compacted clay liners of low hydraulic conductivity and high retention capacity are widely used to isolate urban waste leachate. The aim of this work was to evaluate the hydraulic conductivity and heavy metal adsorption capacity of two smectitic clays to determine their hydraulic and geochemical properties to be used as clay barriers in landfills. Hydraulic conductivity tests of sand-clay mixtures permeated with distilled water and a real leachate were performed. Adsorption of Cu(II), Zn(II), Ni(II) and Cd(II) from monometal solutions on clay fractions was evaluated through batch adsorption tests. Hydraulic conductivity of the specimens permeated with a real leachate was of 1 to 3 orders of magnitude higher than the ones permeated with water. This could be attributed to the highly salinity of the leachate which contributed to a more flocculated state of the clays and the dissolution of soluble mineral phases. The heavy metal adsorption data were fitted with Langmuir model. The adsorption capacities of the analyzed metals were in the following order: Zn(II) > Cu(II) > Ni(II) > Cd(II) for CATAE bentonite and Zn(II) > Ni(II) > Cu(II) > Cd(II) for NTOL mudstone. The adsorption capacity of Cu(II) and Zn(II) was higher than the cation exchange capacity (CEC) of the analyzed clays, whereas for Cd(II) and Ni(II), the retained quantity is lower than the CEC. On the other hand, the hydraulic conductivity of the sand-clay mixtures was lower than 1 x 10 -9 m/s. These results indicate the suitability of the tested clays to be used as hydraulic and geochemical barriers in landfills according to the international legislation requirements for clay liners.
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