The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) took three actions Nov. 5 on how existing municipal solid waste landfills in Arizona, West Virginia and Pennsylvania will meet its 2016 emission guidelines. EPA finalized the West Virginia plan, effective Dec. 7, and proposed approving a Maricopa County plan and a delegation of the federal plan to the Allegheny County Health Department. Comments on both proposals are due Dec. 7.

The 2016 guidelines require landfills that emit 34 megagrams or more of nonmethane organic compounds a year to install gas collection and control systems, down from 50 megagrams under the 1996 guidelines, according to the Allegheny County proposal. State plans were due May 30, 2017. Where no plan is approved, the federal plan EPA finalized May 21, 2021 applies.

Maricopa County’s Plan Sat at EPA for Four Years

The Maricopa County Air Quality Department adopted Rule 321 on Sept. 28, 2022 and submitted it Oct. 4, 2022. Since July 5, 2023 the department has enforced the federal plan under a delegation agreement that ends once EPA approves the county rule. The rule covers landfills that began construction, reconstruction or modification on or before July 17, 2014. Arizona’s earlier statewide landfill plan, built on the 1996 guidelines, won EPA approval in September 1999 and took effect that November.

West Virginia’s approved rule, 45CSR23, was submitted Nov. 18, 2021 after EPA’s 2020 risk and technology review of landfill standards. EPA proposed approval in March and received one comment, unrelated to the plan. The agency keeps authority over alternative test methods and site-specific methane generation rate constants. The final rule lists two effective dates, Dec. 7, 2026 in its dates section and Jan. 4, 2027 in the regulatory text.

Allegheny County Would Run the Federal Plan for Three Landfills

Allegheny County has an approved plan for the 1996 guidelines but none for 2016. The county health department asked EPA to withdraw its 1999 plan and let it implement the federal plan under an agreement effective April 7, 2026. Three existing landfills in the county are covered, though the proposal does not name them. Local rules can set tighter limits than the federal floor, as Colorado did when it adopted its own landfill methane requirements.

Collected landfill gas also supplies methane capture and renewable gas projects, and a United Nations report has widened its methane focus to include waste. Comment periods on the Maricopa County and Allegheny County proposals close Dec. 7, the same day West Virginia’s approval takes effect.