Most Trash Incinerated Despite Recycling Effort|辛苦做垃圾分類 恐還是進焚化爐

The public in Taiwan has often place their household trash into different recycling bins. However, as the prices of recycled materials continue to fall, several local environmental departments have confirmed the reports that most trash end up in incinerators, making people's recycling efforts a waste of time and energy.


Despite the effort of placing household trash into different recycling bins, it is questionable whether the glass bottles, paper containers and plastic waste will actually be recycled. The volunteers feel frustrated when they hear that the trash might end up in incinerators.

Different types of paper have different quality, let's average them out. (What if all the recycled trash ends up in incineration?) That's just not right.

The professionals in the recycling industry are in a conundrum. Take the prices of recycled glass for example: opaque white glass is priced at only NT$ 0.8 per kilogram, and the price for unsorted glass is less than NT$ 0.1 per kilo. The price for recycled paper is NT$ 3.2 per kilo, NT$6 per kilo for bottles. The containers made of thin plastic and paper are not worth recycling since the cost exceeds the selling prices.

The recycling costs of many types of material end up more expensive than the selling prices. There isn't enough profit to pay for the labor required. Therefore, a lot factories have stopped recycling these materials.

Several local environmental departments have admitted that the materials that are turned down by recycling professionals mostly end up in incineration. Taichung City has implemented a new policy that encourages the residents to place glass and paper into seven detailed categories in order to reduce the need for incineration.

We have (put policies in place) to encourage our residents to categorize their trash. For the recycling industry professionals, this would greatly reduce the amount of labor and cost required.

Currently, only Taipei and Taichung City have managed to reduce the cost of recycling by asking residents to categorize their trash. Other cities and counties are increasingly relying on incineration.