Semakau Landfill is located about 8km south of Singapore. A 7km perimeter rock bund was built to enclose a part of the sea off Pulau Semakau and Pulau Sakeng to create the space required for the landfill. The bund is lined with impermeable membrane and a layer of marine clay. This ensures that leachate from the refuse is contained within the landfill area. Other ancillary facilities were also built on the island to ensure that the landfill operation is self-sustainable.

The landfilling process at Semakau Landfill:

• Upon arriving at Semakau Landfill, the barge berths at the enclosed transfer station building. The tugboat then disengages itself and returns to TMTS with an emptied barge.
  

Semakau Landfill Transfer Station Building

The large barge being pushed by the small tug boat

A closer look at the tug boat

Large excavators with interchangeable and specially designed grabs unload the solid waste from the barge. The solid waste is then placed onto 35-tonne payload off-road dump.

Large Excavators working hard to transfer the ashes from the barge onto the huge dump trucks waiting in the gigantic transfer station building

A 10m-wide paved roadway along the top of the perimeter bund provides access to all sections of the landfill.

The dump trucks travel to a designated tipping site and unloads the incinerated ash and non-incinerable waste into the landfill cell.

Bulldozers and compactors then level and compact the incinerated ash and non-incinerable waste.

Each cell is covered with a layer of earth once it has been filled to ground level. Subsequently, grass and trees take root to form a green landscape. A new tipping cell is activated by sealing off the concrete pipes that connect the cell to the sea. An empty space into which solid waste will be dumped is created.

Bulldozers dumping soil onto the cell after its used

The grass growing on the cell after covered with soil

You can learn more about this amazing island by watching this video:

More photos of Semakau Offshore Landfill: