Retrospective Circularity Through Landfill Mining

Landfilling doesn’t eliminate waste. It is only a mechanism for temporarily storing waste, which means environmental issues continue to persist. Waste in landfills can pose serious risks to the environment and human health, including the emission of potent greenhouse gases such as methane, foul odours, leachate-contaminated groundwater, and the loss of circulating resources vital to a sustainable economy. Landfills are still being created globally, in addition to those that already exist. This alone is a valid reason for us to explore how we manage them, since their impact, both short and long term, can potentially generate a multitude of adverse consequences. Landfill mining (LFM) offers a method to reduce the risk of various contaminants entering the environment from landfills and to recover useful materials from discarded and buried waste. By shifting the view of landfills from waste storage to a source of resources, LFM can help reduce long-term environmental problems, support the circular economy, and change how society manages buried waste. The concept of Landfill Mining (LFM) has emerged as a possible solution to increasing issues in waste management, such as limited landfill space, pollution, and the need to rehabilitate sites. Early LFM projects mainly recovered small quantities of materials, such as soil and waste fuels, but encountered many obstacles, including technological constraints, high costs, and strict regulations, which made LFM less common. Recent research and technological advances suggest that LFM could achieve much more if the right conditions are met. With active enforcement of policies such as extended producer responsibility (EPR), government oversight, and improved material processing, LFM could scale to industrial levels, helping recover more resources and manage legacy waste. Clear guidelines for responsible waste management will be vital for ensuring this over the long term. LFM is not just a way to create value from waste; it also helps implement circular economy principles. This paper describes LFM as a form of ‘retrospective circular economy.’ LFM can transform old landfills into urban mines, converting buried waste into useful raw materials and helping society move towards sustainability.