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Modern sanitary landfills must include a liner system, a runoff collection system, a methane collection system, a groundwater monitoring system, and after closure, a cap.

Ambient air samplers are used to monitor the air around a landfill for excessive amounts of methane and other gases.

The most widely used factors for selecting a landfill site are groundwater depth, surface water vicinity, elevation, land slope, soil permeability, soil stability, flooding susceptibility, lithology and stratification, faults, land use type, nearby settlements and urbanization, cultural and protected site vicinity, ...

There are four critical elements in a secure landfill: a bottom liner, a leachate collection system, a cover, and the natural hydrogeologic setting. The natural setting can be selected to minimize the possibility of wastes escaping to groundwater beneath a landfill.

Slope is the basic criterion for landfill site selection. High slope areas are not suitable for landfill site due to construction cost and probable mass movement hazards. For this reason, areas having higher slope degrees are assigned to comparatively low scores.

A sanitary landfill operation generally should be located only in fine to medium grained soils having low rates of permeability. Soils of this type are the loams, silt loams, and clay loams. There can be exceptions to this, such as some strip mine areas.

Landfills comprise a bottom liner made from clay and durable synthetic plastic; a leachate collection system to remove liquids; a stormwater management system that keeps surface water from flowing into the garbage; and a methane collection system that removes landfill gas as it is generated.

Landfills cannot be built in environmentally-sensitive areas, and they are placed using on-site environmental monitoring systems. These monitoring systems check for any sign of groundwater contamination and for landfill gas, as well as provide additional safeguards.