“The UK is about to face a build-up of plastic waste. “At the beginning of the new Year, Britain’s major media collectively voice. The key to the British public opinion is China’s import ban on foreign waste, and its regulations are in force in recent days.
According to the Xinhua news agency earlier last July, the State Council issued the “ban on foreign waste import to promote solid waste imports management system reform implementation plan.” Under the implementation plan, the importation of waste plastic from living sources, waste paper without sorting and waste textile raw materials, vanadium slag, etc. are prohibited before the end of 2017. By the end of 2019, a gradual cessation of the import of domestic resources can replace solid waste.
At present, Britain is thinking about the future of rubbish, the short-term practice is to export waste to Vietnam and India, but these countries can accept a limited scale, if incineration will also face a series of environmental problems.
The BBC said 2nd that it is not clear how Britain will achieve this long-term goal and how to address the short-term crisis caused by the Chinese ban.
Half of UK plastic waste exports affected
China’s ban on imports of “foreign trash” has made Britain anxious. The UK waste disposal industry estimates that about half of the plastic waste exported to China for recycling will be affected by the ban because it does not meet China’s new standards.
“The plastic waste involved will be between 70,000 tonnes and 80,000 tonnes per quarter,” the FT said last month, citing a report by Green Peace group Greenpeace (Greenpeace). Other markets are unable to receive so much waste … Storage capacity in the UK will quickly tighten. ”
An employee of the waste treatment consultancy, 360Environmental, said last year the UK exported 264,000 tonnes of plastic waste to China, more than One-third of the UK’s total plastic waste exports.
Liby Pick Libby Peake, senior policy advisor to Green Alliance, a think-tank, said the waste might need to be “landfill, incineration or stacking” in the UK.
According to Greenpeace, the UK relies on China for low-cost recycling of waste to meet its environmental objectives, and has exported 2.7 million tonnes of plastic waste to the mainland of China and Hong Kong, China, since 2012.
As early as last September, the British Ministry of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and industry representatives convened a meeting, according to minutes, the Chinese ban on the British waste recycling companies and local municipal authorities can have a huge impact.
“I have no exaggeration to say that the industry supply chain will be greatly affected,” said an employee at IWPP, a waste paper disposal company. ”
“For decades, market forces have pushed the waste reprocessing business to Asia, but we are now likely to be blocked,” said Adam Rhide, a spokesman for the Suez, a waste management company with 70 local municipal authorities. ”
In July 2017, according to the Xinhua news agency, according to the State Council issued the “ban on foreign imports of solid waste import management system reform Implementation Plan”, China before the end of 2017, the high risk of environmental pollution, the masses of the strong reflection of waste plastics, not sorting waste paper, waste textile raw materials, 24 solid wastes such as vanadium slag are prohibited from being imported and notified under the relevant committee under the WTO’s requirements for transparency obligations.
Simon Elin, chief executive of the UK Recycling Society, Simonellin the BBC: “[The Chinese ban] is a huge blow to us … The rules of the game in our industry have been changed … There is no such market in our country at all. This means that there will be major changes in our industry. ”
Britain turns waste exports to Vietnam, India
“China’s changes should be a wake-up call to the British Government, reminding them to bring this valuable business back to the country by setting clear, sustainable policies that fit industry and environmental policy.” “Red said.
But Britain’s recycling society, UK Recycling Association, says that, according to current circumstances, the UK is still unable to handle most of the rubbish.
The BBC says other Asian countries are also able to take in some of the plastic waste, but very limited, and there is a lot of waste to go nowhere.
Two other important sources of waste recycling in the UK are Vietnam and India, and Vietnam imported 32,000 tonnes of plastic waste from the UK in 2016, compared with India’s, according to a study by Greenpeace.
“These markets will soon be saturated in Vietnam and India, and they will not want to take on low-quality waste in the long term,” added Green Alliance’s pique. ”
“We are continuing to work with the waste disposal industry and the United Kingdom Environment Agency (Environnement Agency) to understand the impact of the Chinese government’s proposed waste import restrictions on the industry as a whole,” the UK Ministry of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said. …… As part of our resource and waste management strategy, we are also looking for ways to deal with more waste recycling at home. ”
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But Simon Elin, chief executive of the UK Recycling society, said he had no idea how to solve the problem in the short term.
Recoup, the UK plastics recycling agency, said China’s import ban would lead to the accumulation of plastic waste in the UK, as well as to waste incineration and landfill.
In response, the BBC said any action to burn plastic waste would be strongly resisted by environmental groups.
“Burning is the wrong choice-it’s a high carbon and non-renewable way, and it will bring toxic chemicals and heavy metals,” said Louise Aichi, a Greenpeace Louise. …… If you build a incinerator, it will exacerbate the one-time-use plastic market over the next 20 years, which is what we need to reduce now. ”
At the same time, Peter Fleming, of the British Local Government Association (Government Association), said to the BBC, “It is clear that incineration will play a role, but not all parts of the UK have incinerators.” ”
Fleming said, “This is a challenge-but only in the short term … We’ll deal with that. In the long run, we need a smarter garbage disposal strategy. ”
Greenpeace’s Louise Aichi to the British government, “the government has been delaying decision-making, shirking its responsibilities and making us a mess.” ”
According to the BBC, the British Environment Secretary Gove Michael Gove admits he is a bit behind the problem.
Gough told the BBC that his long-term goal was to reduce the use of plastic products in the economic structure, reduce the category of plastics, and simplify local authorities ‘ regulations to make it easier for people to judge what is recyclable and not recyclable, to increase the recovery rate.
Gough also said Britain must “stop sending rubbish overseas”.
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In addition, the tax on disposable plastic products, based on the variable rate of return on the ease of recycling, changing the classification of rubbish to meet the new requirements of China’s waste grading, has also been discussed or implemented in the UK.
There are also voices pointing out that China’s ban is good news for the UK recycling industry. Britain can choose its own familiar products and markets, rebuilding some of the capacity lost by China’s ban.
China’s “foreign waste” problem has reached the point of smack
China’s “foreign waste” import ban stems from the need to improve environmental quality, safeguard national ecological environment security and people’s health.
Guo Jing, Director of the International Cooperation Division of China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection, introduced last July that a part of solid waste from imported raw materials has played a role in making up for the shortage of domestic resources.
According to the BBC, China’s waste-recycling companies import millions of tonnes of waste from other countries each year for recycling. According to the International Recycling Agency (according of Analysys Recycling), China imported 7.3 million tonnes of scrap glue and 27 million tonnes of waste paper from Europe, Japan and the United States in 2016.
But Guo Jing also pointed out that with the increasing level of economic and social development in China, imports of solid waste can be used as raw materials exposed a lot of problems. In some countries, solid wastes are transferred to other countries in many ways, and some are even illegally exported. These wastes pollute the environment and damage the health of the masses. In particular, “foreign waste” problem, has reached the point of smack.
Guo Jing Special Introduction, at home and abroad have some unscrupulous businessmen for the benefit of illegal imports, smuggle smuggling “foreign garbage”, causing many environmental problems, we must crack down and investigate.
January 2, the “legal daily” reported that since March 1, 2017, China’s multisectoral has launched 4 of the crackdown on foreign waste. However, there is still a repeated trend of foreign rubbish, the root cause of which is the huge profit attraction.
Reported that some countries are the reason for the export of rubbish, because many countries are prohibited in the garbage collection and treatment of environmental damage, and forced enterprises to reuse waste. But waste disposal and reuse costs are high, so many foreign companies are eyeing the previously lax management of the Chinese market. And some of our lawless elements are bought at the price of garbage to buy back the waste, slightly processed by several times, dozens of times times even hundreds of times times the price to sell. Loopholes in the system, the loopholes in the regulation of solid foreign waste into the country.
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The legal daily said, to this end, the relevant departments of our country to improve the relevant laws and regulations and working mechanisms to form a multisectoral joint effort to strictly regulate foreign garbage smuggling, acquisition, processing and sales of all aspects.
The Financial Times said the impact of the Chinese ban on imports of junk has begun to appear. So far, dozens of people in mainland China have been arrested for trying to import illegal rubbish, and waste paper is piling up on the streets in Hong Kong, China, because the rubbish is no longer accessible to mainland China.