The Environmental Protection Administration's (EPA) budget proposal for the coming year was approved yesterday. Lawmakers didn't cut anything from the proposed appropriation but they did ask the EPA to more actively seek solutions to a host of existing environmental problems.
The Committee for Sanitation, Environment and Social Welfare gave the EPA the full NT$9.43 billion it asked for.
"Considering that all the money will be used for important business, it was better not to cut any of it," DPP legislator Lai Chin-lin (賴勁麟) said at a budget-review meeting yesterday.
According to the EPA, the budget allocated this year was NT$0.3 billion less than that allocated last year.
Legislators listed 10 essential issues regarding pollution control and asked the EPA to pay more attention to them next year.
Of the 10 points, half are about waste-management problems. At the meeting, Lai said that the incineration-oriented policy had created new environmental problems, such as inefficient waste-recycling management, air pollution and an undersupply of household waste to incinerators built only for burning this type of waste.
The EPA, Lai said, should stop building new waste incinerators and turn incinerators that are being built to burn more household garbage into ones for burning non-hazardous industrial waste.
In the future, Lai said, the EPA should focus on reducing the amount of waste and promoting recycling policies. He said that statistics show that a third of Taiwan's household waste is recyclable food leftovers.
In addition, Lai said that some local governments had selected inappropriate sites for the building of landfills and incinerators. He asked the EPA to help local governments to relocate such facilities.
In Yunlin County, Lai said, an incinerator which is currently under construction is located near a protected water-resource area. In Ankeng (安坑), Taipei County, a plan for building a non-hazardous industrial-waste landfill is conflicting with plans to build an ecological park adjacent to the designated site for the landfill.
Lai also said that stricter environmental inspection is crucial to wipe out opportunities for illegal waste handlers to pollute.
Responding to these "additional requests" listed by legislators, EPA head Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said at the meeting that the agency would be willing to evaluate the feasibility of the requests.
"We will try to accomplish the work. If we can't make it, reasons will be given to legislators," Hau said.
The additional requests listed by legislators are not legally binding on the EPA.
EPA officials told the Taipei Times that the agency has focused on improving waste-management policies. To promote recycling food leftovers next year, the EPA allocated NT$300 million, which is twice what the project received this year.
The legislators also asked the EPA to improve its ability to handle oil spills. EPA will allocate more than NT$100 million for handling oil-spill accidents next year.
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