The International Solid Waste Association held its World Congress in Daegu, Korea in October 2011. The location is at the heart of the world's most dynamic region for economic growth.
The congress, with its theme of Waste Management for Low Carbon and Green Growth Society, attracted more than 600 participants from 57 countries. In addition to several specialist sessions, there was a Green Economy forum organised by the United Nations Centre for Regional Development (UNCRED) and the Korean Ministry of the Environment focusing on the contribution of local government.
Korea has committed itself to green growth and the recovery of waste forms a key aspect of that strategy. In her introductory speech to the opening ceremony of the congress, Young-Suk Yoo, the Minister for the Environment noted that 61% of Korea's MSW was being recycled.
There was also an associated exhibition, and while the majority of companies were from Korea I was pleased to see the high degree of educational content within the exhibition. As usual, the final day of the Congress featured visits to waste management and industrial facilities, but in each case the congress participants also had the opportunity of experiencing aspects of Korea's cultural heritage as well.
The conference included a number of sessions devoted to special themes including one on WEEE. The first speaker, Yang-Chul Jang from the Industrial Waste Management Department of the College of Engineering at Chungnam University, Daejeon, Korea examined the development of Korea's approach to the recycling of WEEE and development of its Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) programme for WEEE.
In effect the Korean system parallels the Japanese approach to EPR for WEEE with a limited range of products targeted initially and then further products added subsequently, such as photocopiers, printers and fax machines in 2006. In 2007 the Act on Resource Recycling of Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment was introduced to establish EPR for a wide range of EEE and to introduce the Korean equivalent of the RoHS Directive's requirements as well. It is worth noting that ELVs were only subject to EPR from 2007.
For the future the government has set a target of recovering 4.0 kg/pp/yr of WEEE by 2015 and announced that there are 45 types of domestic EEE that could be brought into the EPR system compared to 10 in 2010. Yang-Chul Jang estimated that by 2017 3.5 kg/pp/yr should come from large home appliances alone.
The challenges for the future include incentives for the recovery of smaller items of WEEE and better technological solutions for larger items in order to extend their working life. For refrigerators and washing machines, for example the average working life is seven to eight years. By contrast it is 2.4 years for mobile phones, which are also one of the current 10 items covered by Korea's EPR legislation.
Overall, what was reassuring was that there were no silver bullets being used for waste treatment in South East Asia, but the mix that we have relied on for some time. In addition, Korea is looking at the potential for new technological solutions to treat its waste, including plasma arc gasification to generate hydrogen to power road vehicles or generate electrical power.
We are now focussing on the preparation for the next ISWA Congress in Florence, Italy in mid-September 2012.
Jeff Cooper
President, ISWA
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