City calls for investment in hazardous waste treatment
Currently, HCMC discharges around 250-350 tons of hazardous waste and nearly 2,000 tons of industrial solid waste every day, with the volume of hazardous waste increasing by 10% annually. If there is investment in these projects, HCMC will have three hazardous waste treatment plants with a daily capacity of 500-800 tons per plant and a safe landfill for such waste with a capacity of 100 tons daily in the 2014-2015 period, according to the HCMC Department of Natural Resources and Environment.
Therefore, the city’s government wants to call for investment in treatment projects, focusing on recycling and using technology to reduce the volume of buried waste.
According to the department, the city has yet to develop any concentrated treatment facilities for hazardous waste. Besides, although there are 13 businesses investing in waste treatment with technologies mainly focusing on burning and solidification, the treatment capacity of these plants is only some 150 tons per day and fails to meet the increasing treatment demand of hazardous waste.
Hazardous waste in HCMC is generated from nearly 2,000 large plants and around 9,000 small and medium production facilities.
As the city does not have landfills for such waste, treatment plants are storing a huge amount of ash, slag and solidified waste containing toxic substances which can cause pollution if not buried carefully.
