Archaeal community structure in leachate and solid waste is correlated to methane generation and volume reduction during biodegradation of municipal solid waste

Duplicate carefully-characterized municipal solid waste (MSW) specimens were reconstituted with waste constituents obtained from a MSW landfill and biodegraded in large-scale landfill simulators for about a year. Repeatability and relationships between changes in physical, chemical, and microbial characteristics taking place during the biodegradation process were evaluated. Parameters such as rate of change of soluble chemical oxygen demand in the leachate (r_sCOD), rate of methane generation (r_CH4), rate of specimen volume reduction (r_Vt), DNA concentration in the leachate, and archaeal community structures in the leachate and solid waste were monitored during operation. The DNA concentration in the leachate was correlated to r_CH4 and r_Vt. The r_CH4 was related to r_sCOD and r_Vt when waste biodegradation was intensive. The structures of archaeal communities in the leachate and solid waste of both simulators were very similar and Methanobacteriaceae were the dominant archaeal family throughout the testing period. Monitoring the chemical and microbial characteristics of the leachate was informative of the biodegradation process and volume reduction in the simulators, suggesting that leachate monitoring could be informative of the extent of biodegradation in a full-scale landfill.