China – Shanghai government blocks construction of electronics recycling plant

Interfax-China reports that district level officials in Shanghai have blocked Loyalty Enterprises Group from building an electronics recycling plant for more than a year due to fears the facility will damage the local environment, a Loyalty Enterprises official said Friday.



Loyalty Enterprises said last year it would establish an electronics recycling plant capable of processing 500,000 old TVs and PCs per year. The plant, located in Shanghai‘‘s Qingpu District, had been scheduled to begin operations at the end of 2004, and reach profitability within three years. However, the head of the Qingpu District Government has staunchly refused to allow the recycling facility to open, saying it will damage the local environment, the Loyalty Enterprises official, who asked to remain anonymous, told Interfax.



"The Shanghai Environmental Protection Bureau (SEPB) has already said our plant can be operated," the Loyalty official said. "The plant‘‘s feasibility has been proven and we received all required documents except for the district government‘‘s to opening it."



Nonetheless, the Qingpu District Government has continued in its refusal to allow the recycling plant, which has already been constructed, to begin operations. The Shanghai Economic Commission and Shanghai Municipal Foreign Economic Relations & Trade Commission both dispatched officials to try and solve the dispute, but both delegations failed to solve the standstill.



Loyalty Enterprises has already invested several millions of Renminbi in building the facility, which covers 15,000 square meters. The company also has an electronic waste recycling facility in Pengzhou of Sichuan Province and in Tianjin Municipality. The plant in Tianjin, which has been operational for several years, only disposes of discarded PC monitors. Loyalty Enterprises had planned to dispose of electronic waste and abstract metals at the Qingpu facility in Shanghai.



Electronics recycling facilities of this kind have begun to appear more often in China, as more electronics products are being sold, used, and thrown away. On September 15, Taiding (Tianjin) Environmental Protection Technology Co. Ltd. kicked off construction of an electronic junk handling and reclaiming plant in the Tianjin Economic Technological Development Area (TEDA) Chemical Industrial Park. The RMB 100 mln (USD 12 mln) facility, occupying 19,000 square meters, is expected to be operational in 2006 and dispose of 30,000 tons of electronic wastes per year.



In addition, a similar facility also began pilot operation in Shanghai, local newspaper Shanghai Morning Post reported. The facility, whose name and location were undisclosed, will retrieve precious medals such as gold, silver, and palladium, and abstract medals from discarded electronics. The company will also crush printed circuit boards for recycling. To date, the company has signed contracts with Philips, Nokia, Canon and Panasonic to dispose of their discarded electronics products. Several Shanghai government departments have also decide to bring their electronic wastes to the plant for disposal, the newspaper said