Chinese Cities Face with the Problem of Trash

Many Chinese cities are now facing the problem of growing piles of trash. Whether to burn or bury the annoying waste has stirred up debate among the public and the government. Wang Ling again.

Reporter:
In Southern China's city of Shenzhen, many of the 31 landfills are overflowing with trash. In the suburb of Bao'an district, bulldozers and compactors are busy burying waste at a landfill that is capable of treating 3,000 tons of trash each day.

But that capacity still falls short of dealing with the increasing pace of the city's trash creation.

Chen Liang, a worker at the landfill, explains.

"According to the designed service life span, the landfill can operate for 18 years. But only seven years after it was put into use, the trash has almost filled the capacity of the landfill."

Actually, Shenzhen is not the only Chinese city plagued with excessive trash.

In the capital city of Beijing, all the landfills can bury about 10,000 tons of trash each day. But the city produces more than 18,000 tons of waste per day. It's estimated that the city will have no landfills left to treat the trash in the next four to five years.

Faced with this environmental problem, many experts and government officials are inclined to burn the trash as a solution.But some environmentalists have expressed their opposition.

Zhao Zhangyuan is an expert from the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences.

"According to my research over a long-time period, burning the trash will cause air pollution. But so far, we have no solution to prevent the effect."

Zhang Fushen, an environmental researcher with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, disagrees.

"The public has a phobia about burning trash. In my opinion, this sentiment is not entirely correct."

Zhang says the pollutant dioxin, which is emitted when the trash is burnt, will disintegrate when the burning temperature reaches 250 degrees Celsius. Amid this debate, the government has also suggested a way of dealing with the trash.

Wang Shancheng is a senior official responsible for environmental protection at the National Development and Reform Commission.

"Burying or burning the trash, either option has its advantages and disadvantages. The most important is that our government should strengthen regulations on the pollution level caused by burning the trash."

The official suggests that big cities burn trash as little land is available to build landfills. As for some small towns, he says they can continue to bury the trash in landfills on the basis that it is pollution-free.

Statistics show that China produces 160 million tons of trash each year. The figure is growing by 10 percent every year.

Trash buried and placed in open air landfills already occupies 500 million square meters of land in the country.

Wang Ling, CRI news.