Waste management in Menghe
Waste management in Menghe is regulated by prefecture-level governments, each of which sets its own standards for waste collection and disposal. The Department of Recycling and Waste Management, part of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, sets national-level guidelines for prefecture-level governments to follow and regulates the processing of bulk waste at large incineration and reprocessing sites.
In 2018, Menghe generated 147,412,000 tons of municipal solid waste, or 274 kilograms per capita. These figures do not include bulk waste produced by factories, mines, and other businesses. The share of waste directed to recycling has steadily increased since the early 2000s, but waste collection services still differ greatly by region, depending on the budgetary resources of the local government.
History
Municipal waste generation rose steeply during Menghe's economic takeoff from the 1990s onward. Rising incomes led to more consumer spending, and consumer spending on a wider range of goods, including products using plastic packaging. This economic takeoff was accompanied by a surge in urbanization, much of it driven by the migration of poor rural workers to the cities. Weak regulations and pro-business policies also led to unsafe trash dumping by small factories.
Concerned about the buildup of trash in city outskirts, the Menghean Socialist Party made urban cleanup a theme of the Disciplined Society Campaign, gathering volunteers and less enthusiastic convict workers to collect litter from city streets and sort out recyclable material. At the height of the city, some cities and towns competed to impress inspectors with spotless streets, which were weighted heavily in the Cadre evaluation system. This approach was not sustainable, however, and much trash was simply dumped in the outskirts or sent to rural landfills.
In the mid-2000s, as part of a broader effort to control pollution, the Ministry of Environmental Protection began setting more stringent national guidelines on plastic use and waste disposal. Facing their own pressure to deal with trash, many prefectural governments expanded recycling programs and tightened their own regulations.
Because of the disparity in development across the country, this has resulted in a system where the quality, efficiency, and cleanliness of waste collection policies varies across the country. Many wealthy coastal cities, such as Sunju and Donggyŏng, have taken impressive steps to reduce waste and increase the share of recycled plastics. The ongoing Civilized Society Campaign has placed a special emphasis on reducing litter and increasing recycling rates, with a focus on urban areas.
Yet in the countryside, and especially in impoverished inland areas, many towns and villages still dump mixed waste in open-air landfills or excavated pits, some of them adjacent to farms and water sources. Recent government initiatives have focused on improving rural trash collection, with mixed success; the nonprofit Waste Management Atlas estimates that in 2018 25% of Menghe's residents lacked access to routine waste collection services.
Waste collection
In areas where waste collection services are available, residents are required to sort household waste into separate categories to aid recycling and processing efforts. The number and type of categories is set by prefectural governments, which also determine where the waste is shipped for disposal or processing. Hwasŏng, for example, only requires that household waste be divided between recyclable and non-recyclable bins with no enforcement, while Daemado implemented a household collection system with fourteen separate categories (biodegradables, aluminum, steel, plastic bottles, plastic containers, batteries, E-waste, colored glass, clear glass, paper, appliances, textiles, items containing mercury, and other waste) and requires trash collectors to return any garbage bags containing improperly sorted items to their household of origin with a note stating the problem. Department of Waste Management guidelines adopted in 2017 recommend that prefectures set no more than seven categories for weekly waste collection, though the law is non-binding and does not specify the content of those categories.
Some cities have also experimented with a pay as you throw scheme to disincentivize waste. In Sunju, non-recyclable trash must be set out for collection in special blue bags, which are sold by supermarkets but distributed and priced by the city government. The price of each bag serves as a tax on non-recycled waste disposal. The Anchŏn city government weighs each bag of trash collected from a property and charges the property owner or landlord on a per-kilogram basis. There is no variable charge for recycling in either city, though many prefecture-level governments issue fines for poorly sorted recycling.
After a 2015 bombing attack staged by Innominadan sympathizers hit Donggyŏng, the city government removed many of the city's public garbage bins on the grounds that they could be used to hide bombs. Residents were instead required to hold on to their trash and dispose of it at home. Despite hopes that this approach would foster a trash-conscious lifestyle, it led to greatly increased litter, especially in tourist areas. Public garbage bins were restored in 2017, though the city government still seals minor ones and installs guards at large collection sites during important or sensitive events.
Recycling
A national law adopted in 2015 requires all prefecture-level governments to publish statistics on the share of municipal solid waste diverted to recycling, and the share of recyclable products diverted to recycling. Donggyŏng led the charts in 2018 with 720 kilograms from every metric ton of recyclable products sent to recycling plants. Several wealthy cities follow close behind, but a number of rural prefectures still have not produced reliable estimates on the breakdown of trash disposal.
Bottle and can return scheme
Following successful policy experiments in some metropolitan cities, the Ministry of Environmental Protection instituted a nationwide container return scheme in 2008. All cans and bottles are currently subject to a ₩5 retail tax on final purchase (roughly equal to 22 international cents). Like other retail taxes in Menghe, this is included in the sticker price but listed separately on the receipt. Revenue from the tax goes to a central fund for recycling collection.
When residents turn in cans and bottles at a collection site, they are refunded ₩5 for each, on a voucher which can be exchanged for cash at a bank, supermarket, or recycling plant. Companies buying vouchers are compensated out of the can and bottle tax fund. The MoEP originally envisioned a nationwide network of automated scanning and compacting machines to process returns, but in poorer areas many recycling centers still count returns manually and pay cash directly.
One drawback of this scheme is that it disincentivizes the re-use of glass and thick plastic bottles. These are taxed the same way as single-use ones, and compacted at the same sites, even though it would be more environmentally friendly for the consumer or business to re-use them. Haeju introduced a separate scheme for reusable bottles in 2013, requiring that they be turned in at the original seller for a ₩10 voucher, but this led both consumers and supermarkets to shift toward cheaper single-use plastic bottles.
Special collection sites
In addition to municipal waste collection and can and bottle return machines, many cities have established dedicated collection sites for special types of waste. Lithium-ion batteries, for example, pose a hazard if shipped to landfills and incinerators, and must be turned in at local collection sites. Like most waste management, special waste categories are regulated by prefectural governments in accordance with national guidelines, and the accessibility of collection sites varies by region.
Beyond the scope of national law, many wealthy prefectures and metropolitan areas have special collection sites for appliances, computers, and used furniture. If still functional, these may be sent to secondhand stores for reuse; otherwise, usable parts are salvaged, and the product is broken down for recycling in different categories. To supplement government work, non-profit organizations have also set up their own clothing donation boxes and furniture pickup services, and have worked to improve recycling services in rural areas.
Imported recycling
During the 1990s, Menghe established itself as a major destination for other countries' waste processing, as part of an effort to feed domestic industry. Recyclable trash bales also provided a way to fill shipping containers that would have otherwise been empty during the return to Menghe. Regulations on the purity of imported plastics and metals were set artificially low to encourage imports, and trade treaties were negotiated with several countries to encourage sustained recycling shipment.
Critics of this approach noted that much of the imported plastic was too dirty or too poorly sorted to allow cost-effective processing, with heaps of unusable material piling up outside recycling plants. An investigative media report in 2010 found that bales of imported plastic were being used for offshore land reclamation and levee fill in Sunju, despite being imported with a promise that they would be recycled. Many residents also complained that much domestic waste was being left unrecycled while processing plants focused on imported material.
In 2011 the Ministry of International Trade and Investment announced that it was raising purity requirements for imported plastic, metal, and e-waste. Foreign suppliers were given an 18-month period to adapt to the new law, either by washing and re-sorting waste before export or by shipping it to another country. Even with 18 months' warning, many recycling exporters were unable to adapt in time, and due to the cost of washing and re-sorting in a developed economy much of the waste was instead shipped to Byzran.
Other disposal
Landfill
Despite efforts to expand other forms of waste disposal, over 50% of municipal waste in Menghe is ultimately deposited in landfills. Inland provinces, which have lower population densities and more unused land, have even higher landfill dumping rates, and often import trash from coastal prefecture collectors. Many large landfill sites were chosen in the 1990s and early 2000s, with little regard for future environmental impact, leading to problems with soil pollution and runoff into rivers.
A few coastal cities, most notably Sunju, have used garbage as filler in land reclamation and levee construction projects. Much of Kimhae International Airport in Donggyŏng was built using this method. Cities in mountainous areas, such as Gyŏngsan and Daegok, use landfill in plateau creation projects.
Small, open-air trash pits remain the dominant form of waste disposal in rural towns and villages. Many of these sites began as drainage ditches, open-pit mines, excavation sites for nearby earthworks, or dug-out foundations for abandoned construction projects; others are empty lots on the outskirts. MoEP efforts to fight rural trash dumping have made little headway, in part because these areas tend to lack the money for organized waste collection services, and rural areas have increasingly relied on domestic non-government organizations for waste cleanup and recycling collection.
Organic waste
Most Menghean prefecture-level governments have a separate trash collection category for biodegradable waste, which is composted into fertilizer for use on farms. Both public, private, and non-profit composting sites exist, and Menghean research firms have made major advances in compost aeration, anaerobic composting, and the recapture of carbon released from decaying organic material.
Some cities have a separate, additional category for prepared food waste, which can be ground up and used as animal feed. The latter practice has spawned a debate on food safety and organic livestock, with defenders of feed recycling arguing that pigs on small farms have long been fed food waste from owners' households.
The government has taken a harsher stance on the recycling of gutter oil for human consumption, staging raids against restaurants and street vendors suspected of using cooking oil from illicit sources. A central government initiative launched in 2009 encourages the conversion of reclaimed oil to biofuel, as this reduces oil dumping in landfills and water sources and does not require the diversion of food stocks to biofuel production.
Incineration
Due to a shortage of land for new dumping space, many coastal cities have set up state-run incinerator plants to process non-recyclable waste and generate power. Though the earliest of these were infamous for poor regulation and high pollution, many of the newest plants have been built with state-of-the-art industrial technology, including fluidized bed designs which offer more efficient burning and fewer toxic by-products. National legislation introduced in 2014 requires incinerators to meet stringent emissions requirements, either through efficient burning or exhaust scrubbing, and the closure of non-compliant incinerators has contributed to Menghean emissions reduction efforts.
Hazardous waste
Ongoing waste collection programs aim to gather more hazardous household products, such as automotive oil filters, acid batteries, paint cans, and printer cartridges, at dedicated sites which can separate out polluting substances and even recycle them as raw materials in future products. Coverage of these collection sites is very good in urban areas, though inspections at rural open-air dumps have turned up dangerous levels of soil contamination.
Heavy metals and rare-earth elements pose a particularly strong risk, as they are widely used in Menghe's lucrative consumer electronics sector and can seep into groundwater if electronics are left in landfills. State-run and state-subsidized facilities that specialize in separating out these metals have cropped up around the country, and research on improved reclamation techniques is growing, but a number of experts have expressed concerns over the increasingly small and dispersed nature of rare-earth and heavy metals in computer chips, which makes recovery difficult but still allows contamination.
Radioactive waste from Menghe's nuclear plants is sealed in protected drums and buried at Naran Gaja, an arid site in the northwest which was irradiated after Menghe's first nuclear test in 1984. Some waste has also been used for reprocessing to extract usable fuel. As the Naran Gaja site fills up, there is discussion of long-term plans to seal waste in disused mineshafts or dedicated deep-bore sites in watertight clay; the Naran Gaja site is relatively shallow, and it could be uncovered by wind erosion within the next 200 years. As of 2019, evaluation of different options is still underway.
Waste reduction
As part of the broader effort to reduce landfill and incineration use, the Menghean government has also launched initiatives to curtail excess consumption, especially consumption of single-use plastics.
Political efforts to suppress consumption are nothing new in Menghe, and they played a central role in the total war economies of the Greater Menghean Empire and later the Democratic People's Republic of Menghe. During the Disciplined Society Campaign, the Socialist Party imposed punishing taxes on luxury goods, and high sin taxes on cigarettes and alcohol. Currently, however, consumer spending makes up more than half of Menghean GDP, and efforts to manage consumption conflict with the MSP's agenda of sustained economic development.
Beginning in 2011, some cities and prefectures experimented with bans on single-use plastic bags, and with per-bag taxes. After this led to some reduction in plastic use, a nationwide law four years later required supermarkets to phase out the use of thin single-use bags. Compliance was mixed, and the law exempted takeout and delivery services. Debate on the issue resumed in 2019, after an independent study concluded that paper and cotton bags release more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Hyangchun experimented with a policy to let customers bag their items in blue bags which could be used in garbage collection, but the idea drew little traction due to the bags' existing association with trash.
More recently, the explosion of online delivery services for consumer goods and prepared meals has led to discussion of how to limit packaging use. Several cities have already banned the inclusion of disposable utensils in ordered food, and there is ongoing policy discussion of how to define "excessive packaging" in national regulation.
Plastic roads
Faced with an excess of poorly washed thin plastic waste, some policymakers have advocated for plastic roads as a solution to disposal. Menghe's first plastic-composite road was built in Gangwŏn Province in 2017, and subsequent experiments have spread through the country.
Advocates of plastic road construction in Menghe argue that it can help solve the problem of insufficient demand for recycling chips, as lower-grade and lower-purity materials can be used and reprocessing costs are lower. Some studies also suggest that roads made with plastic-asphalt composite are more durable than asphalt roads and easier to repair. Critics contend that in addition to increasing the economy's dependence on plastic production, plastic road construction exposes workers to unsafe fumes during the heating process, and could allow microplastics to seep into soil and groundwater around the road surface.
Relationship with the informal economy
Though many of Menghe's garbage incinerators, compost mills, and recycling processors use modern technology, large stretches of the waste collection chain still rely on labor-intensive methods. In cities which do not require residents to sort household waste before collection, waste arriving at recycling plants is separated into categories by hand, and even sorted waste must pass manual inspection to remove improperly sorted items. At some facilities, magnets and conveyor belts assist the process, but the final round of separation is almost always done by hand. Many of these workers are employed on a flexible basis and paid minimum wage, and their medical benefits are not proportionate to the health risks involved.
The role of the informal sector is even clearer in rural areas, where garbage-pickers - often the poorest local residents - sort through trash in open-air landfills in search of reusable products. So-called "town and village recyclers," small privately run warehouses in the countryside, pay garbage pickers on a per-kilo basis for any recyclable items they bring in; because the pickers are not formally employed by the recyclers, they are not subject to minimum wage and workplace safety regulations.
During the Disciplined Society Campaign, police cracked down on garbage-pickers, charging them with trespassing and unsanitary behavior. Enforcement was later handed over to landfill managers, who seldom enforced the law as they could make more money by collecting "fees" from town-and-village recyclers, but the legal status of garbage-pickers remained precarious.
As part of an effort to meet national air and soil pollution requirements, South Donghae Province launched a campaign in 2015 to close down rural recycling plants, which generally use old equipment for chipping and compacting and operate without the correct permits. Contrary to expectations, recycling rates dropped and public garbage increased, as major recycling plants were unable to take up the slack in rural trash collection, while offerings for full-time garbage sorting jobs met little demand.
After several failed attempts to adjust policy in South Donghae, the national government turned to an alternative approach in Goyang Province, which had achieved major recycling improvements by integrating garbage-pickers into the formal economy. The Menghean Labor Party, a coalition member in the National Assemvly, argued strongly for a policy which would favor low-income workers rather than middle-class residents. Chŏnghae, Gangwŏn, and West Chŏllo provinces implemented policies similar to Goyang's in 2017, decriminalizing garbage-picking and offering subsidized clean equipment to rural recycling plants. Overzealous officials in the city of Chŏnghae even ordered 1970s-style People's Militia uniforms to give out to independent garbage collectors, a move which drew criticism for its irony in a policy over reuse of clothing. The new policy was well-received in rural areas, and led to an increase in the share of recycled goods. As of 2019, a similar set of policies is being phased in nationwide, and there is discussion of how to improve safety and medical benefits for garbage pickers while allowing work to continue on a piece-rate, informal basis.