Solid domestic waste landfill in the Olkhonsky district as the source of environmental risk in the Baikal natural area

The Irkutsk Region ranks ninth in Russia in terms of the amount of solid domestic waste (SDW) formed and the third in the Siberian Federal District (after the Kemerovo Region and the Krasnoyarsk Territory). At the same time, the region ranks as one of the last in terms of waste processing and disposal. The number of unauthorized waste deposits is large. In rural areas, the practice of centralized waste disposal is practically absent; the local residents store it onsite and near their houses, in the wood lines and forestlands, in the nearby gullies and hollows, etc. In recent years, the recreational impact on the Baikal Natural Area has extremely increased. There is a serious problem of unauthorized waste deposits on Olkhon Island, the Olkhonsky and Irkutsk Districts as well as other districts located along the highways leading to Lake Baikal. The current work presents a survey of solid domestic waste (SDW) landfill in imel-Kutul locality, situated 12 km from Baikal and 42 km from Yelantsy settlement, commissioned in 2011 due to the environmental risk. It is determined that during the five-year service of the landfill, methane emission from the surface ranges from 4 to 18 mg/m3. Taking into consideration that the landfill is located in the rural areas and the food waste is practically not tossed as garbage, what is confirmed by the morphological composition of SDW from Olkhon Island, it can be concluded that at this stage of filling the landfill, the environmental risk for the environment and personnel can be classified as medium.