dioxin formation in landfills

[Neil Tangri <ntangri@essential.org>]

Hi folks,

A question about landfills: in many places, landfills are merely open dumps
without any methane collection system, so they periodically catch fire
spontaneously and smolder for long periods of time. I was concerned about
the possibility of dioxin formation from the PVC and other plastics that
are dumped in these landfills, but on reflection it seems that the
temperature would be too low for dioxin formation. Does anyone have any
information on this?

Neil