Yunlin: The Yunlin County government has successfully reduced the county's overall trash volume by 7 percent through a policy of searching residents' garbage bags and rejecting them if they contain recyclables or food scraps.
According to Focus Taiwan, Zhang Qiao-wei, the director of the Yunlin Environmental Protection Bureau, stated that Yunlin's waste output had increased to around 400 metric tons per day during the COVID-19 pandemic. This rise was attributed to changes in consumer behavior, including an increase in packaging waste from online shopping and inadequate separation of recycling and trash.
To address this issue, the Yunlin County government implemented a policy in March requiring waste management workers to inspect some residents' trash bags. Bags containing food scraps or recyclables were rejected. Since the policy's implementation, workers have examined approximately 100,000 garbage bags, rejecting nearly 20,000 due to the presence of recyclable materials.
Additionally, 61 garbage trucks carrying approximately 1,000 metric tons of trash were rejected at unloading sites because inspectors found improperly sorted garbage. While Zhang did not specify the handling of these rejected loads, a Facebook post from Yunlin's Taixi Township Office in July 2024 indicated that responsible waste disposal crews were required to sort the garbage manually.
Teng Ya-chen, head of the bureau's Waste Management Division, noted that the county's monthly trash volume last November was 1,200 metric tons lower than in July, translating to about 7 percent less trash per day. Currently, Yunlin generates 360 metric tons of trash daily, with a goal to reduce it to 340 metric tons by year-end.
The Yunlin Environmental Protection Bureau highlighted that the county lacks a waste incineration plant and previously depended on other cities and counties for waste disposal. In recent years, the county has embraced a "zero waste" strategy and commenced producing solid recovered fuels from reclaimed waste.
The remaining garbage is either incinerated at the Mailiao Refinery or sent to six local landfills. With increased self-sufficiency in waste disposal, Yunlin aims to gradually clear its landfills, repurposing the sites for other uses once cleared.