The Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) should be more active instead of letting local governments argue with one another, environmental groups said yesterday, as Yunlin County’s garbage problem evolved into a political issue.
About 8,000 tonnes of garbage have piled up into a hill the height of a four-story building in Yunlin’s Douliu City (斗六), Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator-at-large Chang Li-shan (張麗善) told a news conference held jointly with Douliou Mayor Hsieh Shu-ya (謝淑亞) on Wednesday.
Kaohsiung had promised to help burn Yunlin’s trash on the condition that Yunlin takes back 1.8 tonnes of furnace slag for each tonne of trash burned, Chang said.
However, because the Douliou City Government did not offer any space for the slag, the Yunlin County Government refused to collect the city’s garbage, she said, adding that the incinerator in the county’s Linnei Township (林內) should be initiated as soon as possible.
EPA Deputy Minister Thomas Chan (詹順貴) later said that “initiating Linnei’s incinerator is not currently the government’s policy,” adding that the county government should negotiate with its cities and townships to find space to temporarily store the slag.
The Yunlin County Environmental Protection Union and other environmental groups in a joint statement yesterday said that garbage should not be allowed to become a political bargaining chip.
The EPA should not allow local governments to argue with one another, union chairman Chang Tsu-chien (張子見) said, adding that the agency should ask Kaohsiung to reduce the slag it exports.
Taichung only requires other municipalities to accept 200kg of slag per tonne of trash burned, he said.
Chan yesterday said that 1.8 tonnes of slag were indeed too much, but that the EPA had to respect the deal between the local governments.
“Currently, we are finding public construction companies to help de-chemicalize Yunlin’s slag, so that it could be used at construction sites,” Chan added.
The EPA is reviewing its regulations on garbage treatment and will publish a draft next month, Chan said..
The exchange ratio might be set at 500kg of slag per tonne of trash burned, he added.
However, the garbage problem was mostly a political problem, Chan said.
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
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