The Sanitary Landfill Site

The main method to deal with the garbage in Taipei is “burning”, and the second way is “burying”. The incombustibles of the burying ashes and the ditch mud would be buried finally. So after visiting Nei Hu Incinerator Plant, we went to Shanzhuku Sanitary Landfill Site.

The Sanitary Landfill Site in Shanzhuku

When we arrived at Shanzhuku Sanitary Landfill Site, Mr. Chen Zhi Zhong received us heartily. He took a brief introduction about the burying place for us, and then we went outside to the observatory to watch the whole working area. We saw there were several excavators which were delivering the ashes, from the incinerator plant, to the burying place and doing the burying work.

Shanzhuku Sanitary Landfill Site had the natural and topographical advantages. It located in Shanzhuku valley Nangang District, on the southeast corner of Taipei City. It is a north to south bound valley about 100 meters wide 1800 meters long.

It was a closed burying place and there were five kinds of refuse:

1. The Ashes after Burning: There were two kinds of ashes. One was flying ashes and the other was bottom ashes. The bottom ashes could be the materials to pave the road. The flying ashes included the ingredient of dioxin and metal, so it would be solidified and buried.

2. The Ditch Mud and Soil: There were about 100 trucks of mud delivering to the Landfill Site every day. The source of the mud was mainly from the road side-gutters or from landslide. The mud would be delivered to the pool to be dried and buried.

3. The Large-sized Discarding Furniture: The valueless furniture would be squashed by smasher machine and sent to the incinerator to burn. If the furniture could be repaired, it would be sent to the repair center. After repaired, the furniture, such as cupboards, fans and bikes would be sent to the recycled furniture exhibition to show and to be sold.

4. The Spring Beds: The big excavator stripped off the soft mattress. The iron spring would be sent to the recycling place.

5. The Tree Trunk and Branches: The machine would squash the tree trunk and branches into small pieces to be the compost heap. Since most of them were the shade trees which might contain the heavy metal, they suggested the compost was not used in agriculture.

The Site opened on June 18, 1994. It was planned to use 10 years and should closed on June 18, 2004. But since the year of 2000 TDEP started the waste reduce, and the recycle policy, the waste reduced from 2500 tons per day in 1994 to 54 tons per day in 2007. The Site would postpone the closed date to December 31, 2010.

The Environmental Maintenance Park

Shanzhuku Sanitary Landfill Site had set up the public facility of indoor swimming pool and had the goal to build up the environmental maintenance park with the functions of environmental maintenance, education, and entertainments. It would be the good example of sanitary landfill site.

In order to reach the goal of “No Need to Bury the Garbage and to Recycle Totally” in 2010, TDEP have given fresh impetus to many items of garbage treatment. One of the items was to build up Shanzhuku as the environmental maintenance park having the functions of education and entertainments in the daily time and disaster relief place in the urgent time.