How Hong Kong's waste problem has grown with its wealth
The problem of what to do with refuse is a relatively recent one; when most Hongkongers were poor, they found a use for everything - including bodily waste - writes Jason Wordie
Waste disposal remains a hot topic in Hong Kong, especially since the controversial incinerator project for Shek Kwu Chau, off southern Lantau, was – against all logic – finally approved.
Everything about this project is wrong: a remote location with high scenic amenity; exorbitant projected costs; outdated incineration technology; prevailing summer winds that will blow noxious fumes back towards the city’s most built-up areas, where air pollution is already a critical problem; and the cost of transporting solid waste there and removing the resultant ash.
Nothing makes sense except that the whole exercise provides a profitable boondoggle for those in the powerful construction sector, who will directly benefit.
Brownfield sites around Tuen Mun, where the ash will eventually be transported for concretemaking purposes, are by far the best locations for such a facility.
But all were rejected for the flimsiest reasons.
None of the relevant officials were prepared to admit publicly that – as ever – powerful northwest New Territories vestedinterest groups simply wouldn’t accept an incinerator in their own backyards. Because what passes for government these days has no meaningful control in that part of Hong Kong – as recent parallel trading protests have demonstrated – sensible options were rendered politically and practically impossible. Our hapless Environmental Protection Department officials knew it. And that was the end of the matter.
