Panyu pans plan to build incinerator
- Source: Global Times
- [01:08 December 11 2009]
- Comments
By Zhang Lei
A long-planned incinerator project in Panyu, South China's Guangdong Province was halted Thursday in order to consider new plans.
Meanwhile, residents were asked to sort their garbage to help recycle more, according to Yangcheng Evening News.
After it was proposed several years ago, many residents trashed the incinerator project as a potential health hazard.
"From today on, we will start from the beginning," said Tan Yinghua, the district Party secretary at a meeting with representatives from the local residents, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
The government will familiarize residents with the procedures of the incinerator construction, location selection, environment assessment, and let residents participate in the feasibility study between January 2011 and December 2012. The location of the incinerator will be decided afterwards.
A pilot project to reduce garbage production in the city will kick off in two communities and schools in Panyu next year, as garbage classification is gradually implemented with a goal of recycling 30 percent of all trash by 2012.
A Jiaxi, a resident from Panyu, told the Global Times that it is the right decision to promote garbage classification but problems remain for the garbage processing afterwards.
"There will be no problem for us to carry out the classification," he said. "Yet as I know the company in Guangzhou doing a pilot project of garbage sorting has no capacity to process the sorted garbage."
He claimed that the incinerator was unlikely to be built amid such public opposition and it takes time to prove the feasibility of the proposal.
A Guangzhou resident urged legislation of garbage classification and reduction of commodity packaging.
Han Zhipeng, a member of Guangzhou Committee of Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, said Guangzhou residents are eager to put garbage classification into practice and some are already trying it at home.
He suggested that the establishment of a registration-based system to enforce garbage sorting and strict fines for violators.
Hundreds of residents protested outside a government office last month, before the authorities promised to review the project.
