Shek Kwu Chau IncineratorBy: Sheryl, Justin, Jacky and Ayesha

We took a trip to Soko Islands and Shek Kwu Chau Incinerator Site

The Incinerator?

The Hong Kong Government has planned to build an Integrated Waste

Management Facilities on Shek Kwu Chau. It would be expected to be

completed by 2018 if the Legislative Council's finance committee had

approved the funding. The incinerator is hoped to be able to burn about

3,000 tonnes of waste per day. It has been given approval by Legco to

be built off the coast of Lantau Island as shown on the next slide.

We saw finless porpoises near the site of incineration

They are one of the six porpoise

species. Genetic studies indicate

that they are the most basal living

member of the porpoise family,

although there is a degree of

taxonomic uncertainty about them.

Sight of the incinerator

The project is to construct and operate

a modern Integrated Waste

Management Facilities (IWMF) for

managing municipal solid waste

(MSW) under a design-build-operate

contract agreement. Along with the

incinerator they plan on having a

mechanical sorting and recycling plant

with design capacity of 200 tpd.

What is the rationale for the incinerator

The rubbish in Hong Kong needs

somewhere to go, we can’t keep filling up

our landfills (as shown here on the right)

Hong Kong needs an immediate solution to

handle it’s rubbish situation and the

incinerator seems to be the only method.

The incinerator can also partially provide

Hong Kong with energy.

Advantages - Environmental

● Alternative solution, minimise the use of land/landfills.

● reduces amount of solid waste (landfill sites can be

sustained for a longer time)

● reduces amount of organic waste by 95%

Advantages - Social

● Eliminates our waste

● Generates electricity

● Saves money and carbon footprint

on transport of waste to landfills

Disadvantage: Environmental

● Air pollutants/smoke - CO2/CO - Acidification - plants and

animals die off food chains or bioaccumulative toxics

● Carbonation

● Boat traffic

● Push certain animals to extinction

● Dredging and reclamation = Kill finless porpoises + damage

one of the best areas for Hong Kong Fisheries

Disadvantages: Social

● Heavy blow to tourism

● Reduces potential for

creating jobs in waste

sorting, recycling etc.

Best Alternatives:

● Reduce Waste - In the end its up to us to make a difference and if we

could take small steps we could eventually make a bigger change eg. ban

of the plastic bags proved to be effective. We need more ideas like this to

drive to success

● More action at the district level

● Deal with food waste

● Increase recycling

Sources:

http://www.worldwildlife.org/stories/saving-the-finless-porpoisehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finless_porpoise

http://www.scmp.com/business/article/1566571/shek-kwu-chau-incinerator-best-solution-hong-konghttp://www.scmp.com/business/article/1628505/shek-kwu-chau-incinerator-smells-even-it-startshttp://www.legco.gov.hk/yr11-12/english/panels/ea/papers/ea0326cb1-1385-2-e.pdf

Thank You!