Beijing may face new garbage crisis

Following that of 1983, Beijing may face another garbage crisis. On the morning of June 8, relevant department officials under Beijing Municipal City Planning and Appearance Management Committee said during an interview with Beijing Public Service Radio that due to a rapid increase in garbage output, the 13 garbage disposal and landfill sites will be filled up within four years, and there is a lot of pressure to set up new garbage disposal facilities and reduce the garbage output.

Existing landfill sites can only be used for another four years

Wei Panming, the Facility Section Deputy Chief under Beijing Municipal City Planning and Appearance Management Committee, said that at present, Beijing produces 18,000 tons of garbage every day. Supposing that garbage output has an annual growth rate of 8 percent, by 2015 total garbage annual output will reach nearly 12 million tons.

At present, Beijing has a total of 13 landfill sites, of which two large ones have already been filled up and closed, and the remaining sites will only last another four years. In other words, if garbage output is not reduced and new garbage disposal facilities are not established, Beijing will have nowhere for its garbage in less than four years. The situation is so severe that if no measure is taken, another garbage crisis will soon appear in Beijing.

Statistics show that Beijing had a garbage crisis in 1983, when 4,699 garbage dumps surrounded the city.

It takes five to six years to set up a new landfill site

Generally, it takes five to six years to set up a new landfill site. Wei Panming said that environmental requirements must be considered when establishing garbage disposal facilities. For example, the site selected must be at least 500 meters away from residential areas, and issues such as groundwater protection and the influence of climate and wind direction must also be taken into consideration. The number of places in Beijing that are suitable for landfill sites has become extremely few.

Deng Jun, Deputy Chief of the City Appearance Section said that the situation of overloaded operations at landfill sites has become extremely severe in recent years, and at present almost all are overloaded. From now on, not only must the construction of new garbage disposal facilities be accelerated, but also the task of classifying garbage must be expedited while garbage output should be reduced, in order to reduce the volume of garbage from the roots.

Translated by LOTO