With many families spring cleaning their homes in the lead-up to Chinese New Year, environmental officials are urging residents to take advantage of free recycling services for electronic and consumer appliances.
The program is run by the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA). In March 1998 the agency began to recycle old TV sets, washing machines, refrigerators and heating and air-conditioning units.
By the end of last year, according to EPA officials, more than 1.85 million electronic appliances had been treated at six recycling plants contracted by the EPA's Recyclable Resources Foundation.
EPA officials said that the recycling rate for TV sets, washing machines, refrigerators and heating and air-conditioning units was exceeding 80 percent.
From the old appliances, the recycling program has retrieved 4,900 tonnes of metals, 1,530 tonnes of plastics and 750 tonnes of glass, which can be turned into 91 million beer cans, 28 million PET bottles and 30,000 20-inch TV screens.
"We have to recycle these electronic appliances -- which are mainly composed of metals, plastics and some hazardous components -- because they can not be treated appropriately in landfills or incinerators," said Chang Juu-en (
Chang said that recycling consumer appliances would not only take pressure off landfills, it would also prevent potential environmental pollution caused by the leakage of toxic materials.
When visiting the Perfect Recycling Company last week -- a recycling facility in Kaohsiung County's Tafa Industrial Complex that's equipped with imported Germany technology -- Chang was met by Chen Wen-sheng (
According to Chen, before consumer appliances can be recycled, closed work-rooms must be used to extract refrigerants, which often contain chlorofluorocarbons, from refrigerators or fluorescent powders and graphite from TV monitors.
Recycled materials -- such as copper, iron, aluminum and glass -- are sent to smelters for further treatment and purified refrigerants can be reused. It's estimated that 2kg of refrigerant can be extracted from each refrigerator.
As for collected hazardous materials -- such as fluorescent powders and graphite -- Chen said they would be eventually treated by qualified waste handlers.
Roughly 1.5 tonnes of hazardous fluorescent powders are being stored temporarily at the Perfect Recycling Company.
"Highly efficient facilities here make it possible to recycle 82.5 percent of the materials," Chen said.
He said that in 2000 and last year, the company recycled 40,000 tonnes of electronic appliances, which included 470,000 TV sets, 250,000 washing machines, 300,000 refrigerators and 100,000 heating and air-conditioning units.
This year, Chen said, the company would adopt European technology to treat fluorescent tubes. Since January, the EPA has recycled waste fluorescent tubes, which were sent to landfills in the past.
Mercury and hazardous chemical compounds from the waste tubes would often leak and contaminate the environment.
As Chinese New Year is approaching, the EPA's deputy administrator Chang said residents can easily dispose of unwanted electronic appliances through diverse channels, such as electronic appliance retailers and local garbage collection teams.
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