The eagerness of the government to burn garbage as a solution to the shortage of landfill sites has left it with an unusual problem: there is not enough garbage to burn.
According to the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA), by the time 36 new incinerators have been completed in 2003, about 90 percent of the garbage generated in Taiwan will be burnt.
PHOTO: CHIANG YING-YING, TAIPEI TIMES
Anti-incinerator activists, however, say that the proliferation of recycling programs has resulted in a dramatic drop in in the amount of waste generated in recent years, making the policy of building so many incinerators absurd.
PHOTO: LIAO RAY-SHANG, TAIPEI TIMES
The Green Citizens' Action Alliance says that by 2003, Taiwan will have incinerators capable of burning 30,400 tonnes of household waste per day. However, last year the country generated only 21,000 tonnes of waste per day.
"The amount of waste generated in Taiwan is still in decline due to the promotion of recycling. So, what are we going to burn?" said Chen Jian-zhi (
The success of the EPA's recycling program means that 7.3 percent of household waste was recycled this year, up from 5.1 percent last year.
Until the 1990s, landfills were the usual destination for garbage. By the end of 1993, 90 percent of household waste was dumped in landfills.
Small and densely populated, Taiwan quickly ran out of landfill sites to dump garbage. By the mid-1990s, large waste incinerators in urban areas began operation to take the pressure off landfills.
But by the end of 1998, 75.3 percent of waste was still sent to landfills, while 19.6 percentage was burnt. Another 5.1 percent was disposed of in other ways, such as outdoor burning and dumping.
So the EPA set a target of burning 90 percent of waste by 2003, and started construction of public and private incinerators to meet that goal. If it succeeds, Taiwan will burn proportionately more garbage than any other country.
At a public hearing at the Legislative Yuan last week, Chen said that the country has unnecessarily been building waste incinerators everywhere.
He offered the example of an incinerator which is planned for Linnei township (
Chen argued that the EPA's own statistics imply that the county doesn't need the incinerator. Chen said the entire county generated only 647 tonnes of waste per day last year, down from 762 tonnes per day the previous year.
"In the future, as more and more waste is recycled, the amount of waste will drop dramatically," Chen said.
Chang Tsui-ping (
"In our village, more than 30 percent of the waste can be recycled," Chang said.
The recycling rate in Wutu is much higher than the national average, where the recycling rate rose to 4.8 percent last year from 0.6 percent in 1998.
Many residents of Linnei township believe that the planned incinerator will pollute their water supply because the proposed incinerator is just 1.8km from an area earmarked for a new water-treatment plant.
Changhua County faces the same problem. Residents near the site of the planned Changpei waste incinerator, which would have the capacity to treat 800 tonnes of household waste a day, fear it will pollute cattle and dairy farms 1.5km away and say the waste produced in the area does not justify an incinerator.
According to the county's environmental protection bureau, residents produce an about 1,280 tonnes of waste a day, which is handled mostly by the county's landfill and an incinerator with 900 tonnes of daily capacity.
According to the bureau's statistics, the 900-tonne incinerator treats an average of 720 tonnes of garbage a day, about 80 percent of its capacity.
Similar cases highlighting the potential shortage of garbage to burn have emerged around the country and legislators are starting to question the EPA's waste-burning policy.
"We all remember the garbage wars that resulted from the shortage of landfill sites a decade ago, when garbage that no one wanted to take responsibility for was dumped on counties' borders," said DPP legislator Lai Chin-lin (
According to the build-operate-transfer agreements for some of the incinerators, local governments have to provide guarantees to the incinerator operators on the amount of garbage they will burn.
Hualien County has been criticized by environmentalists after it promised to supply 320 tonnes of waste a day to a planned incinerator with a capacity of 400 tonnes.
During each incinerator's first 20 years of operation, the builder has the right to charge the local government if it fails to supply the agreed amount of garbage.
This kind of agreement has led to squabbling between local authorities.
One notable case occurred in Kaohsiung County, where two incinerators with a combined capacity of 2,700 tonnes fought over the 1,200 tons of waste generated each day by the residents.
Kaohsiung City faces the same problem. Two public incinerators in the city with a combined capacity of 2,700 tonnes share the 1,800 tonnes of waste generated each day.
As a result, environmentalist suspect that industrial waste is being treated at public waste incinerators, which are designed to burn household waste.
In January this year, the EPA revised the Waste Disposal Act, allowing non-hazardous industrial waste and non-infectious medical waste to be treated by existing waste incinerators. The EPA said the law needed to be revised to prevent illegal dumping and provide a way for dealing with non-hazardous waste.
The change in the law has allowed some incinerators to sign deals with industrial companies to make up for the lack of household waste. And demand from industry seems to be enough that the incinerators can even raise their prices.
The Peitou waste incinerator in Taipei City recently announced that the charge for treating non-hazardous industrial waste next year would rise to NT$2,000 per tonne from NT$1,600.
"We suspect that incinerators now under construction are designed to burn toxic industrial waste because it's more economical for the industry," said George Cheng (鄭益明), the executive general of the Taiwan Watch Institute, an environmental group.
Activists said that the handling fee for treating toxic solvents in Taiwan was about NT$10,000 per tonne.
Environmentalists criticize the new policy because they fear that incinerator operators lack the professional skills needed to inspect the waste sent to incinerators.
Chen, of the Green Citizens' Action Alliance, says the EPA should be investigate rumors that the Peitou waste incinerator has been treating hazardous industrial waste.
EPA officials said, however, that special operation guidelines for treating non-hazardous industrial waste have been followed by operators at the incinerator, which can burn 1,800 tonnes of waste a day.
"We have a comprehensive mechanism to inspect all waste sent to the plant because we previously discovered some toxic solvents which were mixed up with non-hazardous industrial waste," said Tsai Huei-min (
Tsai said that details about the waste treated at every incinerator would be released to the public on the Internet to allay people's fears.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique