Policy

Germany, Japan and UK

All these countries takes different recycle policy measures to regulate their recycle rate.

 

We don’t have MSW waste charging which people can dump for free; we don’t have producer responsible scheme for plastic which merchants do not take responsible for their own consumer’s waste. Then the landfill site is taking 15,000 metric tons of mix waste every day.

HK Landfill most

Why Hong Kong is so behind and recycling is so bad?

We are landfilling 15000 tons per day and landfill tax is free for households. Commercial landfill tax is from 50-150 HKD per ton only. UK landfill tax is already 85 GBP ( 850HKD) per ton already.,

Government Waste Disposal Facilities for Construction Waste and Charge Level

The following government waste disposal facilities accept different types of construction waste:

Government waste disposal facilities
(Please see location map)
Type of construction waste accepted
Charge per tonne#
Public fill reception facilities
Consisting entirely of
inert construction waste++
$71
Sorting facilities
Containing more than 50% by weight of inert construction waste++
$175
Landfills@
Containing not more than 50% by weight of inert construction waste++
$200
Outlying Islands Transfer Facilities@
Containing any percentage of
inert construction waste++
$200
# Except for the Outlying Islands Transfer Facilities, the minimum charge load is 1 tonne, i.e. if a load of waste weighs 1 tonne or less, it will be charged as 1 tonne. A load of waste weighing more than 1 tonne will be charged at 0.1 tonne increment. For Outlying Islands Transfer Facilities, the charge is $20 per 0.1 tonne and the minimum charge load is 0.1 tonne.
++ Inert construction waste means rock, rubble, boulder, earth, soil, sand, concrete, asphalt, brick, tile, masonry or used bentonite.
@ If a load of waste contains construction waste and other waste, that load will be regarded as consisting entirely of construction waste for the purpose of calculating the applicable charge.

資料來自:http://www.epd.gov.hk/epd/misc/cdm/b5_scheme.htm


以下是英國政府堆填稅

Proposed revisions

Legislation will be introduced in Finance Bill 2016 to amend section 42(1)(a) and 42(2) to provide for the new rates of Landfill Tax. The rates being amended and the new rates will be:

Waste sent to landfill Rate from 1 April 2016 Rate from 1 April 2017 Rate from 1 April 2018
Standard rated £84.40/tonne £86.10/tonne £88.95/tonne
Lower rated £2.65/tonne £2.70/tonne £2.80/tonne

source: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/landfill-tax-increase-in-rates/landfill-tax-increase-in-rates

Recycler's difficulties

PLASITC RECYCLING IS TURNING WASTER PLASITC INTO NEW PLASITC RAW MATERIAL

Plastic bottles recycle problems.

We have high cost for labor and truck fee. The fix cost of one truck pick up is already HKD 800-1500 subject to different truck size or labor pick – up time.

Now a PET drinking bottles weights around 0.02kg( 20g) while the deliver price for bottles is around 0.8HKD per kg. it means a bottle only worth 20cents HKD deliver to the recycle factory. Plastic is light and consume volume of the truck, we may be able to put at most 200-300 kg on a small truck. It means we have lose money for every single truck pick – up. Without service charge reimburse, there is no recycle action in Hong Kong for plastic bottles.

Now people can dump for free and government doesn’t have policy. Plastic bottles dumping is seen everywhere.

Lack of a healthy recycle industry

We have been using China as an excuse to dump our recyclables. However, since 2013, China tightened the import waste standard of having sorted and clean waste allowed only. Hong Kong plastic action was dead by then as there is not enough profit for private owned companies to do sorting/ cleaning of the plastic waste. The following is the news launched by private sector. Since then, only government sponsors NGO to perform recycling. However, the tons collected from those NGOs are around 30-40 tons per day while we are landfilling 2800-2900 tons per day.

 

News in 2013:  http://hk.apple.nextmedia.com/news/art/20130504/18249001

Therefore, the recycle rate for plastic has been dropping year by year, we can check on EPD website.

https://www.wastereduction.gov.hk/en/assistancewizard/waste_red_sat.htm

We start to collect plastic bottles and washed it in 2016. However, there is not local plastic bottles delivered to us due to the above reasons. We even have to share a part of land with other companies to survive. However, we still find it very difficult by 2016.

2017 China launched “national sword” for waste.

CN Gov:  http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2017-02/08/content_5166341.htm

2018 China bans plastic waste import. So, where are we now?