Beijing incinerating rubbish to address landfills issue

BEIJING: Beijing now incinerates the majority of its unsorted household rubbish to address its sprawling landfills and as a more environmental friendly way to treat waste, city authorities said.

At least 60% of the city’s household waste is now incinerated or is treated, compared with just 30% in 2013, said Sun Xinjun, director of Beijing Municipal Commission of Urban Management.

By the end of next year, Beijing will have increased its rubbish treatment capacity to 24,000 tonnes a day, said Sun.

“By then, all the waste will be incinerated or biologically treated. No untreated garbage will be buried.”

He said Beijing’s waste treatment capacity had improved greatly over the past five years, with 42 treatment facilities having been built or renovated to ensure harmless, environmental friendly ways of disposal.

“Instead of just burying waste, we are now pursuing more sustainable means of disposal, hoping to minimise harm to man and nature and turn waste into energy,” said Sun.

The most common waste-to-energy conversion process generates electricity or heat directly through combustion, while some also use industrial processing to produce combustible fuels like methane and ethanol.

This supplies energy and reduces carbon emissions.

Sun said the treatment facilities were built in line with national standards, and emission limits are equivalent to, or even stricter than, European Union standards.

“So these plants won’t become sources of pollution.”

In the meantime, Beijing authorities have encouraged citizens to create less waste and improve waste sorting, he said.

With 21.7 million permanent residents, Beijing’s huge amount of household waste poses a thorny environmental issue. — China Daily / Asia News Network