After two companies were investigated by prosecutors in Kaohsiung City recently for providing incinerator operators with low-grade activated carbon — used to absorb dioxin emissions during waste incineration — the plans current Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) had as chief of the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) to build an incineration plant in each city and county have once again received a lot of attention. The EPA hoped to build 36 incinerators around the country capable of handling 24,000 tonnes of trash per day. Because of doubts expressed by environmental protection groups, experts and academics and protests from local residents, however, plans to build some of the incineration plants were canceled.
EPA statistics show that the 24 incineration plants now operating around the country are capable of handling approximately 20,000 tonnes of trash per day. There is a trash recycling rate of about 30 percent because of government enforced recycling and an increased public awareness. The statistics also show that the trash produced by each Taiwanese per day has dropped to 0.5kg, creating a total of approximately 13,000 tonnes of trash daily.
Government policy is that recycling rates are expected to reach 40 percent by next year. That should mean that the trash produced in Taiwan daily would drop to about 10,000 tonnes per day and most of the incinerators would run out of trash to burn.
The contracts for incineration plants built as BOT projects state that the government must pay operators NT$2,500 per tonne of trash that each plant is certified to handle, even if there isn’t that much trash. To use the BOT incinerator project in Linnei (林內) Township, Yunlin County, as an example, former Yunlin County commissioner Chang Jung-wei (張榮味) signed a contract with the operator guaranteeing 600 tonnes of trash per day for incineration. This implies that the government must pay the operator a total of NT$1.5 million per day, more than NT$500 million a year, in trash disposal fees. This contract was signed for a period of 20 years, even though the daily amount of trash in Yunlin County is currently only 300 tonnes.
The recent report about low-grade activated carbon also dealt a severe blow to the EPA’s ability to monitor incinerator operations. It clearly shows that the government does not know how to control and test dioxin emissions at incinerators and that operators were using activated carbon of poor quality for as long as six years without the authorities finding out. The EPA needs to reassess its policies for monitoring and managing incineration plants.
Incineration is not the best way to handle trash. Apart from the dioxins produced during incineration, other poisonous gasses are also emitted. When we burn trash, it doesn’t just disappear, it is merely transformed into pollutants that are smaller and harder to see. Heavy metals are an example of substances that cannot be disposed of via incineration. Such substances must be sent to special landfill sites for disposal.
Last year, a scandal erupted surrounding dioxin-contaminated ducks. It was caused by illegal disposed dust and slag.
The real source of trash is unbridled consumption. Mass consumption and unbalanced lifestyles waste money for everyone and damage the environment. Politicians should see the bigger picture instead of blindly and persistently encouraging people to consume more and forgetting the high price we all have to pay.
As long as the government fails to clear up the contradictions and inconsistencies of its policies, we must become more responsible and smarter as consumers.
Chang Hung-lin is chairperson of the Green Party Taiwan.
TRANSLATED BY DREW CAMERON
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