The Ministry of Environment is to propose a management plan for large-scale post-disaster temporary waste storage by the end of February, Minister of Environment Peng Chi-ming (彭啟明) said today.
The move follows a fire that broke out at the Wushulin temporary waste storage site in Tainan’s Houbi District (後壁) on Nov. 21.
The Tainan Fire Bureau is investigating the cause of the fire and penalties would be imposed if the city’s Environmental Protection Bureau is found to have been at fault due to improper planning, Peng said.
Photo: Yang Chin-cheng, Taipei Times
The Legislative Yuan’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee today invited Peng and other agencies to report on waste management issues.
Taiwan currently has 33 exposed “trash mountains,” he said.
Since the end of last year, 53 exposed garbage sites were identified and 20 have since been eliminated, he added.
As of the end of last month, Taiwan had 608,000 tonnes of waste exposed in garbage pileups, the ministry said.
About 444,000 tonnes, or 73 percent of the total volume of those “trash mountains,” are in Hsinchu County, Tainan and Nantou County, it said.
However, proper waste management has been achieved in Pingtung County and Chiayi City, it added.
The ministry originally aimed to reduce exposed garbage to 410,000 tonnes by the end of the year, although typhoon-related waste and food waste have been sent to incinerators in place of the exposed garbage and has overwhelmed capacity, Peng said.
The goal remains to ensure proper treatment of all exposed waste nationwide by the end of next year, he said.
The ministry also said it is studying Japan’s approach to managing large-scale post-disaster temporary waste storage, finding that differences in stacking scale, height and density of waste processing in Japan help prevent major fires.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
ANNUAL EVENT: Two massive Pokemon balloons are to be set up in Daan Park, with an event zone operating from 10am to 6pm This year’s Taipei Floral Picnic is to be held at Daan Park today and tomorrow, featuring an exclusive Pokemon Go event, a themed food market, a coffee rave picnic area and stage performances, the Taipei Department of Information and Tourism said yesterday. Two massive Pokemon balloons are to be set up in the park as attractions, with an exclusive event zone operating from 10am to 6pm, it said. Participants who complete designated tasks on-site would have a chance to receive limited-edition souvenirs, it added. People could also try the newly launched game Pokemon Pokopia in the trial area, the department said. Three PokeStops are
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
RSS