Will incinerators get smaller - between the system and the field in 1995

Will incinerators get smaller - between the system and the field in 1995

In the spring of 1995, Japanese society was seeking a balance between environmental policy and local industry in the unstable economic environment following the collapse of the bubble economy. In the field of waste management, in particular, the challenges of dealing with rapidly increasing waste, tightening landfills, and new environmental risks such as dioxin were becoming more and more pressing. The government's "incineration-oriented" policy was effective in reducing the amount and volume of waste, but at the cost of heavy responsibilities for the development of pollution-prevention facilities and for accountability to residents.

In this roundtable discussion, four parties (environmental officials from local governments, engineers from incinerator manufacturers, waste disposal companies, and environmental engineering researchers from universities) gathered to discuss the current status and future of small incinerators.

Speakers pointed out one after another the gap between the "large incinerator-oriented" policy of the time and the "decentralized, small-scale response" required in reality. In particular, for mountainous regions far from urban areas and small and medium-sized businesses, small furnaces producing less than one ton per day are more realistic and economical than large furnaces producing more than 10 tons per day. However, the legal system still does not fully recognize this diversity, and problems such as "unauthorized installation," "pollution concerns," and "gray zone in the law" have frequently occurred.

A university researcher pointed out, "Until now, the government has dealt with incineration in a simplistic way, but this has not promoted technological innovation in line with local conditions," and said, "What is needed is a flexible system with performance standards and responsibility for the results. On the other hand, a manufacturer engineer expressed his anguish, saying, "Small furnaces developed independently by small and medium-sized companies are inexpensive and have good combustion efficiency, but they tend to be placed at a disadvantage in terms of the system.

The roundtable also discussed the serious shortage of landfill sites at the time of 1995 (1.7 years left for landfill) and the growing corporate awareness of environmental responsibility in the face of the impending introduction of ISO 14000. The waste management field was facing a multilayered set of problems that went beyond mere disposal: local economies, technological innovation, and institutional reform.

This roundtable discussion was a kind of symbol of the year 1995, when the waste problem was shifting from a question of quantity to a question of quality: how to burn it, who should dispose of it, and where to complete the process. It was precisely in this year that Japan's environmental policy was about to turn the corner from a centralized model to a hybrid of locally driven technologies and institutions.