Zongguo Wen

The consumption and recycling collection system of PET bottles: a case study of Beijing, China.

After studying the recycling collection system of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles worldwide, the authors conducted an intercept survey in Beijing. Two separate questionnaires were issued, one questionnaire to PET bottle consumers and one to PET bottle recyclers. In this study, consumers are defined as people that consume PET-bottled beverages in their daily life. Recyclers were defined as those involved in the collection and recycling of PET bottles. These include scavengers, itinerant waste buyers, small community waste-buying depots, medium/large redemption depots, and recycling companies. In total, 580 surveys were completed, including 461 by consumers and 119 by recyclers. The authors found that consumption of PET bottles in Beijing was nearly 100,000 tonnes in 2012. Age, occupation, gender, and education were identified as significant factors linked to PET-bottled beverage consumption, while income was not a significant factor. 90% Of post-consumed PET bottles were collected by informal collectors (i.e., scavengers and itinerant waste buyers). The survey also found that nearly all PET bottles were reprocessed by small factories that were not designed with pollution control equipment, which allows them to offer higher prices for waste recyclable bottles. As Beijing is trying to build a formal recycling collection system for recyclables, subsidies should be given to the formal recycling sector rather than being charged land use fees, and attention should also be given to informal recyclers that make their living from the collection of recyclables. Informal and formal sectors may work together by employing the scavengers and itinerant waste buyers for the formal sectors. In addition to the recycling of PET bottles, concern should also be allocated to reduce consumption, especially among young people, as they, compared to other groups, have a stronger demand for PET-bottled beverages and will be the main body of society.

Methodology for an urban ecological footprint to evaluate sustainable development in China

The ecological footprint (EF) is a method for measuring sustainable development through ecological impact. A methodology is presented for predicting urban ecological footprints. Urban energy use and natural resource consumption were analyzed to calculate an EF based on land type (arable, pasture, forest, fossil energy land, built-up area and water area) and consumption (food, housing, transportation, goods, services and waste). The result was then compared with the local ecological carrying capacity to develop criteria for sustainable ecological footprints. Case studies of four cities in China (Guangzhou, Ningbo, Suzhou and Yangzhou) illustrate the urban EF approach. The time series of EF in a case study of Guangzhou for 1991–2001 was analyzed and the consumption–land-use matrix of urban EF was established. The results show that the cities are ecologically unsustainable, with average ecological conflicts per capita of more than 2 ha. The urban EF method is useful to measure urban sustainable development and provides policy proposals for decision-making. However, the EF method still has limitations and weaknesses.

Scenario Analysis of Sulfur Dioxide Emissions Reduction Potential in China's Iron and Steel Industry

Acid rain remains an important environmental problem. The Chinese steel industry is becoming a key domestic emitter of sulfur dioxide (SO), the central molecular component of acid rain. In this study SO emission potential is assessed by developing a material flow analysis (MFA) model and generating four different SO industry emission scenarios from 2006 to 2030, with each scenario representing a possible development path for the industry. When SO emission factors in every unit of steel production are presumed to remain constant through 2030, scenario analysis results show that under a business‐as‐usual (BAU) scenario SO emissions will experience sustained growth to a peak value of 1.73 million metric tons (megatons, Mt) through 2020, approximately 52% higher than that in 2006, and that this trend is unlikely to be reversed. The high scenario and medium scenario demonstrate that it is difficult to control SO emissions to an acceptable level by only upgrading technology and making industrial structural adjustments. Yet through the incorporation of sintering gas desulfurization, the low scenario can smoothly bridge the gap between the simulative SO emissions and the envisioned value, since sintering is the biggest emitter in this industry. Once the desulfurization rate of sintering gas reaches 60%, SO emissions will be less than the level of 0.60 Mt in 2030 and will also meet the reduction goals. Moreover, scenario analysis suggests that single terminal control cannot solve the problem of high SO emissions. Therefore, in order to control the total SO emissions of the steel industry it is imperative that two or more measures be combined.

Urban Mining's Potential to Relieve China's Coming Resource Crisis

Chinas mineral resource consumption has gone through multiple increases since 1980, resulting in the inadequacy of important strategic resources and a high level of external dependence. Some developed countries have already reduced primary resources consumption through urban mining. Can China also break through the bottleneck of the resource shortage and continue its economic and social development through strengthening of urban mining? This article selected copper (Cu), aluminum (Al), lead (Pb), and iron (Fe) as case studies and established predictive models for metal demand, recycling, and stock, based on stock analysis, material flow analysis, and a life distribution model, and then analyzed the metabolism of the four resources and compared the environmental effects of three scenarios. The study indicates that the urban mining potential of Cu, Fe, Al, and Pb will attain 8.1, 711.6, 37.0, and 12.1 million tonnes, respectively, in 2040. Compared with 2010, the substitution rate (secondary metals substituting primary metals) of Cu and Fe increase by 25.4% and 59.9%, whereas external dependence decreases by 30.8% and 25.7%. However, substitution is not obvious regarding Al and Pb. The low resource scenario decreases resources use, which will reduce external dependence in the short term, whereas the strengthened recovery scenario increases resource recovery and has a larger effect in reducing external dependence in the long term. So, in line with urban mining in the future, China should change its environment and resource strategy, further strengthen layout and construction of urban mining demonstration bases, and encourage the use of recyclable resources to provide a better foundation for urban mining.

Environmental Policies in China: Evolvement, Features and Evaluation

Abstract This article reviews the development of current environmental policies in China: their initiation started following the United Nations Conference on Human Environment (1972 in Stockholm), and got great progress during 1979?2006. Learning lessons from industrialized countries and combining own situation, China realizes the main features of its environmental policies as follow: (1) explore command and control measures to its full extent; (2) strive to raise funding for environmental protection; (3) identify who should take the accountability for environmental protection, (4) encourage”combination of prevention and control” and “integrated utilization”, (5) Open in field of environmental policy and international cooperation earlier. For the past 30 years, Chinas environmental policies have been evolved and deepened: status from national basic policy to sustainable development strategy; focus changed from pollution control to combination of pollution control and ecological protection; method changed from end control to source control; scope changed form point treatment to watershed and territory treatment; management style changed from using executive power to using legal and economic measures. At last, this article introduces the evaluation of policies by the international community and the prospects of them.

Performance evaluation model of a pilot food waste collection system in Suzhou City, China

This paper analyses the food waste collection and transportation (C&T) system in a pilot project in Suzhou by using a novel performance evaluation method. The method employed to conduct this analysis involves a unified performance evaluation index containing qualitative and quantitative indicators applied to data from Suzhou City. Two major inefficiencies were identified: a) low system efficiency due to insufficient processing capacity of commercial food waste facilities; and b) low waste resource utilization due to low efficiency of manual sorting. The performance evaluation indicated that the pilot project collection systems strong points included strong economics, low environmental impact and low social impact. This study also shows that Suzhous integrated system has developed a comprehensive body of laws and clarified regulatory responsibilities for each of the various government departments to solve the problems of commercial food waste management. Based on Suzhous experience, perspectives and lessons can be drawn for other cities and areas where food waste management systems are in the planning stage, or are encountering operational problems.

Forecasting Co2 Mitigation and Policy Options for China's Key Sectors in 2010–2030

The technological status of seven key sub-sectors in three sectors (energy, industry and consumption) was analysed using bottom-up modelling. Using 2010 as a baseline, the paper predicts direct CO2 emission trends, turning points, reduction potentials and costs for the three sectors in two policy scenarios and three technology scenarios for the years 2015, 2020 and 2030. The scenario analysis shows that the industry sector might reach its emissions peak between 2015 and 2020, which leaves more emission reduction potential for the consumption sector. CO2 emissions in the consumption sector will increase through to 2030 without reaching a turning point. In the Social Low Control Middle (SL-CM) scenario, CO2 reduction technology potentials of the industry and consumption sectors will reach 0.84 billion tonnes CO2-eq by 2020. Within this, production contributes 13% of reductions, transportation 48%, and construction 39%. In the 2030SL-CM-scenario, the CO2 reduction potentials rise to 1.6 billion tonnes CO2-eq, within which production contributes 8%, transportation 44% and construction 48%. In building Chinas Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), the government should pay more attention to a low carbon consumption policy rather than a traditional CO2 control policy for the industrial sector.

Environment and economic feasibility of municipal solid waste central sorting strategy: a case study in Beijing

AbstractAlthough Beijing has carried out municipal solid waste (MSW) source separation since 1996, it has largely been ineffective. In 2012, a “Green House” program was established as a new attempt for central sorting. In this study, the authors used material flow analysis (MFA) and cost benefit analysis (CBA) methods to investigate Green House’s environment and economic feasibility. Results showed that the program did have significant environmental benefits on waste reduction, which reduced the amount of waste by 34%. If the Green House program is implemented in a residential community with wet waste ratio of 66%, the proportion of waste reduction can reach 37%. However, the Green House is now running with a monthly loss of 1982 CNY. This is mainly because most of its benefits come from waste reduction (i.e., 5878 CNY per month), which does not turn a monetary benefit, but is instead distributed to the whole of society as positive environmental externalities. Lack of government involvement, small program scale, and technical/managerial deficiency are three main barriers of the Green House. We, thus, make three recommendations: involve government authority and financial support, expand the program scale to separate 91.4 tons of waste every month, and use more professional equipment/technologies. If the Green House program can successfully adopt these suggestions, 33.8 tons of waste can be reduced monthly, and it would be able to flip the loss into a profit worth 35034 CNY.

The relationships between industrial pollution intensity and economic growth based on intensity environment Kuznets curve: study on China’s pilot cities

In order to enrich the study of Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) on pollution intensity, we analyze the relationship between industrial pollution intensity (pollution per GDP) and economic growth (GDP per capita) using data 1993–2012 from 46 Chinese pilot cities. Our study tracks seven types of industrial pollution intensity: wastewater, COD, waste gas, SO2, soot, dust, and solid waste emissions. The relationship statistically follows two stages: industrial pollution intensity begets a rapid initial decrease with development of economy in the first stage and then the reduction rates gradually stabilized in the second stage. Such a curve is named IEKC (Intensity Environmental Kuznets Curve) in this paper. Power function model is suitable for quantitatively describing this hypothesis and a parameter from the model named elasticity coefficient of sustainability (ECS) is utilized for urban sustainability assessment. We find that China cities have a higher level of sustainability in the relationships between industrial wastewater, chemical oxygen demand (COD), dust, soot, and economic growth than the other three pollutants. ‘The after effect’ could be revealed from studying the relationship between ECS and economic development: cities at medium level of economic development usually have greater ECS values than developed ones because the former have learned the latter’s experience of political governance on economy–environment relationship and introduced mature/advanced pollution-controlling technologies.

Integrated control of emission reductions, energy-saving, and cost-benefit using a multi-objective optimization technique in the pulp and paper industry.

Reduction of water pollutant emissions and energy consumption is regarded as a key environmental objective for the pulp and paper industry. The paper develops a bottom-up model called the Industrial Water Pollutant Control and Technology Policy (IWPCTP) based on an industrial technology simulation system and multiconstraint technological optimization. Five policy scenarios covering the business as usual (BAU) scenario, the structural adjustment (SA) scenario, the cleaner technology promotion (CT) scenario, the end-treatment of pollutants (EOP) scenario, and the coupling measures (CM) scenario have been set to describe future policy measures related to the development of the pulp and paper industry from 2010-2020. The outcome of this study indicates that the energy saving amount under the CT scenario is the largest, while that under the SA scenario is the smallest. Under the CT scenario, savings by 2020 include 70 kt/year of chemical oxygen demand (COD) emission reductions and savings of 7443 kt of standard coal, 539.7 ton/year of ammonia nitrogen (NH4-N) emission reductions, and savings of 7444 kt of standard coal. Taking emission reductions, energy savings, and cost-benefit into consideration, cleaner technologies like highly efficient pulp washing, dry and wet feedstock preparation, and horizontal continuous cooking, medium and high consistency pulping and wood dry feedstock preparation are recommended.