“Now listen to me,” Mr. Putin told Environment Minister Sergei Donskoy during a televised government meeting. “Close this landfill within a month.”

The landfill was closed, but the 1,000 or so truckloads of waste produced daily in Moscow had to go somewhere. The regional government distributed the extra waste among the few remaining landfills around Moscow, in some cases overwhelming their capacity. The one near Volokolamsk, in Yadrovo, has seen the lines of trucks in front of its gates increase by at least a quarter.

“In the first half of 2017, I received 80,000 tons of waste; in the second half I had twice as much,” said Maksim O. Konopko, one of the Yadrovo landfill’s owners. “If it weren’t for Kuchino, we would stay within our normal limits.”

In a landfill dump, the incoming waste — most of it consisting of rotting food — is buried with soil. The waste then brews inside, producing biogas, a combination of methane, carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulfide and other components. In the absence of a collection system, the accumulated gas eventually bursts through the soil and vents in large quantities into the surrounding area. The Yadrovo landfill does not have such a system, though the owner plans to install one with the help of a Dutch company.

Mr. Konopko said that he wanted to restrict the volume of waste he was receiving, but that he was getting angry phone calls, pressuring him to take more.

“Do you know what country we live in?” Mr. Konopko said, implying that these were orders he could not refuse.