What is construction of “No-waste City”? Which cities will become pilot cities? Let's get to the bottom of it
The State Council Disclosed that: “No-waste City” Construction Promotion Plan of the State Council proposes to construct a systematic “No-waste City” index schedule and explore comprehensive administration mechanism as well as technical system “No-waste City”. The schedule raised the pointe that urban solid waste treatment should be the main point, whose purpose is zero increase of total urban solid wastes, improvement of resource utilization of agricultural wastes and reduce the emission of life wastes, maintain them under the level of hazard. The schedule aims at preventing occurrence of illegal dumping or transference of solid waste and cultivating a bunch of backbone enterprises in the industry of solid waste resource utilization.
No-waste City is the first step of No-waste Society. Du Xiangwan thinks that building “No-waste City” is the first step to realize “No-waste City”. In fact, in aspect of “No-waste”, many cities and industries in China have made a lot of efforts and have achieved quite a lot on the basis of minimizing the amount of waste. At the same time, sufficient use and recycle of waste are endeavored to achieve nearly zero emissions. Express delivery and fiber industry are typical examples.
The construction of “No-waste City” not only has good environmental and economic benefits, but also has critical impact. It has become China's strategic emerging industries and a new momentum for economic growth. It is estimated that by 2030, the output value of classified resource utilization of solid waste in China will reach RMB 7 trillion, producing about 40 million jobs. However, theutilization cost of solid waste is low. China has made great progress in utilization of solid waste resources, but there are still many shortcomings. As Du Xiangwan put it, the main problems are the insufficient legal system and management system, the unspecified standards, etc.
In the aspect of system implementation and management, the phenomenon of “orders provided by more than one authority” and unclear responsibility is prominent. In resource utilization of the wastes, there is a serious lack of standards such as pollution prevention and control, environmental risk control and other regulations including quality control of environmental health risk of comprehensive utilization products.
At present, the covering scope of tax and government subsidy is limited and the technical innovation is insufficient. Therefore, the problem with resource utilization of solid waste is the existence of high cost, unclear profit and low economic effect, which affect the vitality of the whole market. “Insufficient awareness and low involvement of the public have reduced ‘Not-In-My-Back-Yard Effect’”, Du Xiangwan said some of the city's candidates were not abandoned pilot cities.
At present, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has formulated “No-waste City” Construction Promotion Plan, on the basis of the opinions of various localities, the draft of the development plan, organized the “No-waste City” Pilot Candidate Cities Representative Symposium, Xiamen, Xiong’an New Area, Xixian New Area, Wenzhou City and so on have joined the “No-waste City” Pilot Candidate Activity.
On the policy side, the construction of “No-waste City”, the improvement of legal system, the extension of producer's responsibility and the symbiotic metabolism among enterprises have been promoting the withdrawal of old systems. With continuous optimization of the market structure, resource utilization level will be improved accordingly.
Technical Perspective: Du Xiangwan proposed to increase investment, reinforce the ability in science and technology support, increase state budget input in the field of solid waste resource utilization and attract more social capitals. He proposed that a scientific supporting system to pollution prevention and control technology, standard research, risk assessment, etc. on the basis of engineering labs, industry-university-research platforms, industrial incubators and standard labs shall be developed.
Professor Du Xiangwan said that China is promoting Low-carbon City model and Smart City model. All these should be combined with the “No-waste City” model, “The key to our hope is that the model is implanted in a specific city”.