Overview of household solid waste recycling policy status and challenges in Malaysia

With the annual increase in waste generation and heavy reliance on landfilling as disposal, method in Malaysia, it is just a matter of time before significant problems of space limitations, health, and environmental issues hit the nation severely. This paper attempts to develop an overview on solid, waste recycling in Malaysia at the most basic level of a community or nation which is the household, unit. Households are the main primary source of municipal solid waste in Malaysia, consisting of, recyclable materials at most 70% to 80% of the total waste composition as found placed in the, landfills. Overview on the existing household solid waste recycling policy and program status in, Malaysia is relevant in enhancing solid waste management measure from recycling perspective. Despite the high potential and opportunities for solid waste recycling, wastes are still simply being, dumped in an open area of ground without any attempt for recovery and recycling. Comparing to, recycling rates of neighboring countries, Malaysia is falling back at merely 5% which proves how, uncommon recycling practice is. The government is committed to significantly improve the national's, solid waste management services especially in waste minimization. Fortunately the emphasis on, recycling as a sustainable waste management strategy has taken a shift in paradigm as wastes, separation and recycling are part of the major changes in the current policy implementation. With, issues and challenges in recycling practice that were highlighted in this context especially from the, aspects of information availability and other loopholes within solid waste management policies and, related recycling program within the community, the question on whether the goals in 2020 can be, met remains unsure of but there is a possibility for a successful implementation of sustainable solid, waste management particularly in recycling.     

The effects on waste reduction and recycling rates when different components of the waste stream are counted

States differ in the components or solid waste management activities which they include when determining solid waste reduction and recycling rates. Thus, when attempting to draw comparisons among states, confusion arises in two ways: (1) use of two types of rates; and (2) use of different components or activities when calculating a given rate. This paper presents a mathematical basis for understanding the impacts on rate calculations when variations occur in the components and activities included in those calculations. Estimates of the incremental changes occurring in the rate calculations when incineration or selected components such as yard waste, construction and demolition wastes, and junked automobiles, are added to a base of municipal solid waste constituents are found using national data. Finally, the achieved rates reported by states counting different combinations are compared.     

Sustainable recycling model: A comparative analysis between India and Tanzania

Higher economic growth in developing countries has caused higher amounts of wastes. Local government authorities in these countries usually fail to provide adequate services to dispose the increasing amounts of waste, resulting in threats for both the population and environment health. There is therefore an urgent need for recycling as a form of waste management in order to stop the devastating effects of solid waste in developing countries. Using a qualitative method of analysis, this study presents a model to measure and rank the sustainability of recycling programs in India and Tanzania. The model consists of six main constructs including “production, economic, governmental, social, technological, and international factors”. The results showed that India outperforms Tanzania in sustainable recycling programs: per capita waste generated per day in Delhi is higher than in Dar es Salaam; the government of India focuses more on developing recycling plans and techniques as compared to the government of Tanzania where the country is not actively involved in the recycling process; and the solid waste management planning in India is being performed better than Tanzania.     

Why recycle? A comparison of recycling motivations in four communities

Four Illinois communities with different sociode-mographic compositions and at various stages of planning for solid waste management were surveyed to determine the influence of sociodemographic variables and planning stages on the factors that motivate recycling behavior. A factor analysis of importance ratings of reasons for recycling and for not recycling yielded five factors interpreted as altruism, personal inconvenience, social influences, economic incentives, and household storage. The four communities were shown to be significantly different in multivariate analyses of the five motivational factors. However, attempts to explain these community differences with regression analyses, which predicted the motivational factors with dummy codes for planning stages, a measure of self-reported recycling behavior, and sociodemographic measures were unsatisfactory. Contrary to expectation, the solid waste management planning stages of the cities (curbside pickup, recycling dropoff center, and planning in progress) contributed only very slightly to the prediction of motivational factors for recycling. Community differences were better explained by different underlying motivational structures among the four communities. Altruistic reasons for recycling (e.g., conserving resources) composed the only factor which was similar across the four communities. This factor was also perceived to be the most important reason for recycling by respondents from all four communities. The results of the study supported the notion that convenient, voluntary recycling programs that rely on environmental concern and conscience for motivation are useful approaches to reducing waste.     

The future place of recycling in household waste policy: the case of France

To be rightly implemented, an environmental policy ought to set an institutional framework (goals, rules and instruments) which incents decentralised actors to adopt the appropriate range of technologies. In the household waste management policy, the development of valorisation techniques (and particularly recycling) must be supported by convenient instruments and incentives. The paper analyses the problems encountered with the French household waste policy to ensure the takeoff of recycling techniques. At the moment, a rather under-proportioned institutional setting leads to favour the adoption of incineration with energy recovery at the expenses of recycling. This tends to create a structural bias in favour of incineration.     

Should restoration of small western watersheds be public policy in the United States?

Additional research is needed to determine whether restoration of degraded watersheds in the western United States should become large-scale public policy. Numerous small projects have demonstrated that vegetation can be restored, sediment losses halted, and, in some cases, formerly ephemeral streams made perennial. But if all watersheds in a basin were restored, what would be the overall effects both ecologically and economically? For example, if large-scale restoration of small watersheds were conducted in a western river basin, what would be the effects on water yield and quality for the basin as a whole? Would implementing basin-wide watershed restoration be cost-effective? A means of examining this question is to monitor a watershed prior to and during the restoration process and to compare the results to a control watershed. The watersheds would be instrumented such that the ecological processes and water balance could be monitored both instream and within the associated groundwater system. Overall effects would then be subjected to economic and policy analysis, and modeling would be used to extrapolate the new information over the entire basin. These results would then be available to political leaders and government agencies for determining whether large-scale watershed restoration should be public policy.     

Identifying the key factors in increasing recycling and reducing residual household waste: a case study of the Flemish region of Belgium

The competent waste authority in the Flemish region of Belgium created the 'Implementation plan household waste 2003-2007' and the 'Implementation plan sustainable management 2010-2015' to comply with EU regulation. It incorporates European and regional requirements and describes strategies, goals, actions and instruments for the collection and treatment of household waste. The central mandatory goal is to reduce and maintain the amount of residual household waste to 150 kg per capita per year between 2010-2015. In literature, a reasonable body of information has been published on the effectiveness and efficiency of a variety of policy instruments, but the information is complex, often contradictory and difficult to interpret. The objective of this paper is to identify, through the development of a binary logistic regression model, those variables of the waste collection scheme that help municipalities to reach the mandatory 150 kg goal. The model covers a number of variables for household characteristics, provision of recycling services, frequency of waste collection and charging for waste services. This paper, however, is not about waste prevention and reuse. The dataset originates from 2003. Four out of 12 variables in the model contributed significantly: income per capita, cost of residual waste collection, collection frequency and separate curbside collection of organic waste.     

The impact of economic activity in Asturias on greenhouse gas emissions: consequences for environmental policy within the Kyoto Protocol framework

Climate change is one of the major worldwide environmental concerns. It is especially the case in many developed countries, where the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for this change are mainly concentrated. For the first time, the Kyoto Protocol includes an international agreement for the reduction of the net emissions of these gases. To fulfil this agreement measures designed to reduce or limit current emissions have to be brought into force. Consequently, fears have arisen about possible consequences on competitiveness and future development of manufacturing activities and the need for support mechanisms for the affected sectors is obvious. In this paper, we carry out a study of the emissions of gases responsible for climate change in Asturias (Spain), a region with an important economic presence of sectors with intensive emissions of CO(2), the chief greenhouse gas. To be precise, in the first place, the volumes of direct emissions of the said gases in 1995 were calculated, showing that the sectors most affected by the Kyoto Protocol in Asturias are iron and steel and electricity production. Secondly, input-output analysis was applied to determine the direct and indirect emissions and the direct, indirect and induced emissions of the different production sectors, respectively. The results derived from the direct and indirect emissions analysis and their comparison with the results of the former allow us to reach some conclusions and environmental policy implications.     

Alberta's oil sands reclamation policy trajectory: the role of tense layering,policy stretching,and policy patching in long-term policy dynamics

As the Canadian oil sands development matures, an increasingly important policy activity is reclamation. Reclamation has received limited attention compared with the broader discussion of oil sands expansion, however, and its past direction and future trajectory are unclear. Recent moves to reform the policy in Alberta have been interpreted simultaneously as a major change and a marginal adaptation to the existing framework. This article employs a historical-institutional perspective to help reconcile this debate and further understanding of changes to Alberta's oil sands reclamation policies over the past half century. It traces the factors and outlines the processes which have driven its evolution since 1963 with special attention paid to the 2011 Oil Sands Progressive Reclamation Strategy, the most recent attempt to reform oil sands reclamation policy. The article reveals a complex long-term pattern of policy development in which processes of ‘tense layering’ of new initiatives on top of old elements resulted in a constantly shifting policy landscape as existing policy instruments and settings were ‘stretched’ to cover new circumstances but failed to resolve tensions between successive policy layers. After 1993, however, a more reflective process was put into place in which policy feedback informed alterations intended to reduce or remove tensions between successive layers. Such a policy ‘patching’ process is shown to have helped resolve tensions associated with earlier stretching of the existing regime and adds to the vocabulary of more general studies of policy dynamics.     

The discursive framework of sustainability in UK food policy: the marginalised environmental dimension

ABSTRACT

In the context of food policy, sustainability functions as a normative principle but also constitutes a highly contested arena. The study presented in this paper establishes how discursive dynamics amongst professionals involved in matters of food distribution, retail, consumption and waste lead to food policy themes being framed as issues of sustainability. Analysing varied UK-based data (trade magazine articles, policy documents and interviews with retail, non-profit and consultancy representatives), three interpretative frames of sustainability are identified: consumer sovereignty, economic rationality and stewardship. Focusing on three themes of food sustainability – organic consumption, protein diversity and waste reduction – it is shown how these interpretative frames constitute the discursive framework relevant to food policy. Based on these findings, it is shown how in the analysed debates environmental concerns are sidelined.     

关于固体废物污染环境防治法修改的研究思考

2019年6月,《中华人民共和国固体废物污染环境防治法（修订草案）》（以下简称草案）经国务院审议通过,并初次提请全国人大常委会审议。草案修订力度之大,值得充分肯定。同时,草案还存在不少提升空间,需要进一步深入研究。本文以习近平生态文明思想为引领,按照中央全面依法治国委员会第二次会议提出的加强立法统筹、立改废释并举要求,剖析了当前我国固体废物环境管理及其立法修法中面临的挑战,以及存在的突出问题;并从明确固废污染防治立法原则、强化政府统筹管理、明确各部门职责、强化区域统筹、完善跨区域转移监管机制、统筹国内外相关法律法规及政策文件等方面提出了完善草案的建议,以期为我国固废管理决策和草案修改提供参考。     

Market imperfections in recycling markets: conceptual issues and empirical study of price volatility in plastics

The effectiveness of recycling depends upon efficient functioning of secondary material markets. This paper focus on the role that price volatility can play in slowing investment and market development. However, a statistical analysis of the relative volatility of secondary and primary material prices does not confirm the widely-held belief that relative price volatility is higher in secondary than in primary materials, at least at national levels.An econometric estimation of the determinants of plastic recovery volumes in Seattle contributes to the literature in four ways: the use of monthly (as opposed to annual) data; the use of local (as opposed to national) data; the use of an explanatory variable to reflect price volatility; and, the focus on plastics, which have not been examined previously. Some tentative conclusions can be made: the results generally support the principal hypothesis that price volatility has a negative effect on recovery of secondary materials; in addition, and consistent with previous studies, price elasticities are low and insignificant; and finally, policy factors are clearly important. The concluding section treats the economic and policy implications of market inefficiency in secondary material markets.     

Exogenous factors in collective policy learning: the case of municipal flood risk governance in the Netherlands

ABSTRACT

Conceptualizing and analyzing collective policy learning processes is a major ongoing theoretical and empirical challenge. A key gap concerns the role of exogenous factors, which remains under-theorized in the policy learning literature. In this paper, we aim to advance the understanding of the role that exogenous factors play in collective learning processes. We propose a typology of exogenous factors (i.e. material, socioeconomic, institutional, discursive), and subsequently apply this in a comparative study of flood risk policymaking in two municipalities in the Netherlands. We find that exogenous factors are indeed essential for understanding collective learning in these cases, as the combined influence with endogenous factors can steer similar learning processes towards different learning products. We conclude our contribution by identifying two opportunities for further developing the collective learning framework, namely regarding the distinction of varying learning products, and the dynamics of exogenous factors over time.     

Use of decision analysis interviews to support the sustainable use of the forests in Finnish Upper Lapland

Controversy between alternative uses of forests in Finnish Upper Lapland has been going on for decades, and in recent years it has been escalated to a serious conflict. The core of the conflict is the adverse impacts of forestry on old forests which are important grazing areas for reindeer and which are regarded as intact nature and wilderness areas. This paper describes the experiences of applying multi-criteria decision analysis interview approach on this conflict. The approach provides tools for structuring the problem and preferences of the stakeholders as well as for analyzing the effects of different alternatives in a common framework. We focus on the practical experiences gained from the application of this approach in this context. Multi-criteria decision analysis was found to be a useful approach to evaluate the economic, ecological and cultural aspects of this intense conflict. The obtained experiences also support the view that the approach works best when tightly integrated into the planning process.     

Tracking the implementation of green credit policy in China: top-down perspective and bottom-up reform

The Chinese government has introduced the green credit policy to mitigate the environmental impact of industrialization by reining in credit loans to companies and projects with poor environmental performance. This research investigated the implementation of the green credit policy both at the national and provincial levels. Our results show that the green credit policy is not fully implemented. The wide-ranging impact on high-polluting and high energy-consuming industries, vague policy details unclear implementing standards, and lack of environmental information are the main problems in the implementation of the green credit policy in China. On the other hand, the practice at local level (Jiangsu Province) is more practical by integrating green credit policy with the environmental performance rating system. Finally, suggestions are outlined to improve China's green credit policy.     

Sustainable solid waste management in sub-Saharan African cities: application of system thinking and system dynamic as methodological imperatives in Kinshasa,the Democratic Republic of Congo

This paper is based on a review of the methodological approaches associated with solid waste management (SWM) in the context of sub-Saharan African (SSA) cities. Using Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as a case study, the paper proposes a new way of looking at solid waste in the bid to come up with alternative methods to improve the plight of SWM. A combination of qualitative research methods and system analysis have been employed to evaluate the causal relationships observed in contemporary SWM systems in Kinshasa. This paper argues that there is an absence of coherent and broad-based approaches to SWM in Kinshasa as is common in other SSA countries. Empirical evidence suggests that contemporary SWM strategies and approaches developed on a global scale which have increasingly been adopted by the Congolese national and local government authorities have proven inadequate to address the SWM realities on a local level. Using system thinking and system dynamics, this paper attempts to develop a feasible methodological framework focusing on the formulation of an appropriate approach to improve SWM in Kinshasa. It is argued that new ways of approaching the complexity that exists in SWM will facilitate the adoption of technologies and innovative ways of thinking and managing solid waste in a more sustainable, socially, and environmentally accepted manner.     

Priority screening of toxic chemicals and industry sectors in the U.S. toxics release inventory: a comparison of the life cycle impact-based and risk-based assessment tools developed by U.S. EPA

Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) and Risk Assessment (RA) employ different approaches to evaluate toxic impact potential for their own general applications. LCIA is often used to evaluate toxicity potentials for corporate environmental management and RA is often used to evaluate a risk score for environmental policy in government. This study evaluates the cancer, non-cancer, and ecotoxicity potentials and risk scores of chemicals and industry sectors in the United States on the basis of the LCIA- and RA-based tools developed by U.S. EPA, and compares the priority screening of toxic chemicals and industry sectors identified with each method to examine whether the LCIA- and RA-based results lead to the same prioritization schemes. The Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and other environmental Impacts (TRACI) is applied as an LCIA-based screening approach with a focus on air and water emissions, and the Risk-Screening Environmental Indicator (RSEI) is applied in equivalent fashion as an RA-based screening approach. The U.S. Toxic Release Inventory is used as the dataset for this analysis, because of its general applicability to a comprehensive list of chemical substances and industry sectors. Overall, the TRACI and RSEI results do not agree with each other in part due to the unavailability of characterization factors and toxic scores for select substances, but primarily because of their different evaluation approaches. Therefore, TRACI and RSEI should be used together both to support a more comprehensive and robust approach to screening of chemicals for environmental management and policy and to highlight substances that are found to be of concern from both perspectives.     

碳中和视域下的垃圾精细化治理：日本吸收性卫生用品回收体系的构建经验及启示

通过循环利用，减少吸收性卫生用品产量和废弃量的陡增所带来的碳排放量，将加速碳中和进程。日本提供了吸收性卫生用品回收体系构建的先行经验，即以“政府引导—企业运作—社会团体协作”为顶层架构，明确制度、完备设施、完善渠道、宣传到户等。建议我国取长补短，在夯实法律法规和优化主体协同机制的基础上，重点着眼于突破技术壁垒、推动智慧化监管、深化绿色理念，以点带面推进吸收性卫生用品的回收循环试点，进一步推动垃圾分类精细化治理的进程。     

An economic modelling approach to the design and delivery of sustainable waste minimisation clubs: Prospects in the new policy framework

Since the early 1990s, waste minimisation clubs have been important sources of information for industry in the UK on clean technology and sustainable waste management practice. Despite this contribution, concern has grown about the declining number of clubs, their performance and the likelihood that they will continue to play a key role in national policy.This paper examines the evidence available and provides estimates of how the numbers varied in England since the first clubs were formed. The results presented indicate that, after initial expansion, numbers went into decline. The paper then explores, using economic theory, why this pattern should have developed and suggests it to be a function of how clubs were designed and managed. The results of the analysis are used to propose alterations in how future clubs could be designed so that they continue to contribute effectively to the development of sustainable waste management in UK industry. These lessons are of value to policy in both the UK and other countries considering the development of this important tool of waste strategy. The paper concludes with a number of suggestions for future research.     

长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率的时空演变及其影响因素研究

本文选取1998—2015年30个省份数据,采用超效率SBM模型测算全国、长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率;采用门槛效应模型研判长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率的影响因素.研究发现:1998—2015年长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率大于全国工业废气污染治理效率;长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率与全国工业废气污染治理效率的演变轨迹相似;长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率空间格局从"两极分化型"向"过渡型"演变;长江经济带沿线11省份工业废气污染治理效率与重工业占比呈负相关;当人均GDP较小时,长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率与工业化率、地方法规颁布件数、环境污染与破坏总次数呈负相关,与群众因污染来信数呈正相关;当人均GDP跨过门槛阈值拐点后,相关关系反之.为进一步推动长江经济带高质量发展,应加强中央与地方政府合作共促工业污染防控治理,推动重化工业绿色发展,加强媒体对废气污染的长期有效监督,推动建立科学有效的"三方共治"体系.