Hongkongers pooh-pooh waste treatment plant, despite free spa

Yahoo – AFP, May 26, 2016

The three mineral-infused pools in the glass-walled spa, each with a different
temperature, are powered by the heat from the burning sludge (AFP Photo/
Isaac Lawrence)

Hong Kong (AFP) - It is billed as a groundbreaking way to deal with Hong Kong's human waste, and even includes an onsite spa free to residents, but a new eco-friendly sludge treatment plant has not washed with some locals.

The sustainable T-Park development blends into coastal hills near the town of Tuen Mun in the north of Hong Kong, a sleek low-rise building with a roof shaped like a wave.

Each day, the HK$5 billion ($644 million) plant treats 1,200 tonnes of sludge from the city's wastewater treatment plants to avoid it being dumped in Hong Kong's overflowing landfills.

"We can live together in a dense city 

without making the planet dirty," said 

Antoine Frerot, chairman of Veolia 

(AFP Photo/Isaac Lawrence)

The plant desalinates its own seawater and powers itself by the energy created from burning organic waste in what is the world's largest sludge incinerator.

Built by French management giant Veolia, city officials say it is "one of the most technologically advanced facilities" of its kind and will not emit pollutants.

But locals who already complain about smells emanating from a nearby landfill have protested against bringing yet more waste into the area.

And the building of a free onsite spa has been dismissed by some as a rubbish idea.

The three mineral-infused pools in the glass-walled spa, each with a different temperature, are powered by the heat from the burning sludge.

Seawater used for the pools is first desalinated at the plant and visitors can look out over ocean views as they soak.

They can also have a tour of the plant as part of their trip.

"Pure water is a symbol of purity," Antoine Frerot, chairman of Veolia, told AFP during a tour of the plant by French minister for foreign trade Matthias Fekl Wednesday.

"We can live together in a dense city without making the planet dirty."

However, Cheng Wai-kwan, 49, who lives in a village close to the plant said the spa was less than tempting.

"If I tell you I have a spa near home which is powered by burning rubbish, I don't think anyone would come," he told AFP.

He was among 40 villagers who protested at the site during the plant's official opening ceremony last week.

T-Park, the new sludge treatment facility in Tuen Mun in Hong Kong (AFP

 Photo/Isaac Lawrence)

The spa is due to open to the public next month.

Cheng said hundreds of villagers living nearby were fed up with the smell of the nearby landfill, and he worried it would get worse.

"Basically, you will have tonnes of shit brought to our district every single day. However beautifully it is being packaged, I don't think it is benefiting us," Cheng added.

A Tuen Mun district councillor said locals had never agreed to have the plant being built in their backyard.

"The government is using the spa as a compensation but I don't think it's enough," said Ho Hang-mui.

"Residents already have to shut their windows (because of the landfill). Even if the spa is free I don't think people will be able to enjoy it," she added.

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Bolivia, Peru sign $500 mn deal for Lake Titicaca clean-up

Yahoo – AFP, January 8, 2016

Lake Titicaca, which is the highest in the world, at an altitude of 3,800 meters
(12,470 feet) above sea level, provides a habitat for a number of frogs, birds
and fish, including two species that have almost been wiped out (AFP Photo
/Aizar Raldes)

La Paz (AFP) - Bolivia and Peru agreed to provide more than $500 million towards cleaning up Lake Titicaca, whose polluted waters are home to some animals nearing extinction, a Bolivian environment official said.

The deal, which is meant to improve the lake's biodiversity, includes environmental management and recovery through to 2025.

Lake Titicaca, which is the highest in the world, at an altitude of 3,800 meters (12,470 feet) above sea level, provides a habitat for a number of frogs, birds and fish, including two species that have almost been wiped out.

Bolivia's Environment and Water Minister Alexandra Moreira and her Peruvian counterpart Manuel Pulgar signed the agreement during a public event.

"For the short term we have a limit of $117 million and for the long term $400 million," said Moreira's advisor Sergio Arispe.

“It's a logistical matter we are trying to manage through 2025," he said.

Part of the waste in the lake is generated by the Bolivian city of El Alto, near La Paz, which is home to about 800,000 people.

Peru's minister stressed that the two countries are "already taking concrete actions such as investing in water treatment plants to address the main problems the lake is facing."

Colombia Transforms Old Tires Into Green Housing

Jakarta Globe, Paula Carrillo, Mar 31, 2015

View of houses made with tires in Choachi, Cundinamarca, Colombia on March 16,
 2015. In the same way as igloos, thermally efficient and resistant to quakes,
a particular kind of house in central Colombia takes advantage of a material which
 is thrown away: tires. 5.3 million tires are thrown away each year in Colombia, and
since they take millions of years in decomposing, using them for building becomes
a potential. (AFP Photo/Eitan Abramovich)

Choachí, Colombia. The highlands around the Colombian capital are scattered with small buildings that look like out-of-place igloos but are in fact innovative houses made from the tires that litter the country’s roads.

The woman behind the project is Alexandra Posada, a 35-year-old environmental activist who sports a cowboy hat and jeans while she works, her buff biceps rippling in her tank top as she slings around old tires and shovels them full of dirt.

“I get these tires for free because it’s a huge problem for people to get rid of them,” she told AFP.

“They take thousands of years to decompose — which we’ve transformed from a problem into an opportunity,” she said. “If you use them as construction materials, they become virtually eternal bricks.”

Posada is currently at work on several houses in the mountains of Choachi, a city of about 15,000 people an hour’s drive east of Bogota.

She and her team take truckfuls of old tires and fill them with earth, turning them into massive bricks that weigh 200 to 300 kilograms each.

Using a range of tires from semi trucks to cars, they stack them together around iron bars to create round structures that are at once solid and flexible — well insulated against the heat and cold, but also rubbery enough to withstand the earthquakes common in this seismically active Andes region.

The houses have rounded cement-and-steel ceilings over the bedrooms and kitchen, and flat wood-plank ceilings over the living room and dining room.

Both are covered by another layer of tires, making “an almost non-degradable, impermeable” roof, said Posada.

The houses may be made from waste, but they have a captivating beauty.

The sweeping curves of the roofs are often painted in bright colors.

The walls are covered with tan mortar made of lime and sand, giving them a smooth adobe look interrupted by flashes of color from old glass bottles inserted in the masonry.

Posada also uses glass bottles to make skylights in the bedrooms, inserting them vertically in the concrete ceilings to create a pixelated stained-glass effect.

“These houses are made with reused materials, but they’re also beautiful, airy, with more indirect light,” she said.

Millions of tires

It is an ingenious solution to a tricky problem.

Colombians throw out more than 5.3 million tires a year, according to official figures — nearly 100,000 metric tons of rubber that pollute the environment.

They often end up abandoned in unsightly piles along the country’s roads, or are burned to get rid of them, adding their acrid smell to the clouds of car exhaust that often choke Bogota, a sprawling city of more than seven million people.

“It’s a huge problem in terms of the public space, the environment and the landscape,” said Francisco Gomez, who heads the environment ministry’s response to the issue.

Tire manufacturers and importers in Colombia are only required to recycle about 35 percent of the country’s total consumption.

And sanitation workers are not responsible for removing abandoned tires because they are considered “special waste.”

“The response we’ve been able to implement is pretty small in terms of the quantity of waste being generated,” said Gomez.

Posada has so far used about 9,000 old tires to make the walls, roofs, terraces and steps of her rubber “igloos.”

One of her workers, William Clavijo, a 57-year-old mason, said the job has taught him a lesson in “valuing things.”

“People usually just throw this stuff away. Now you see that it can be put to good use,” he said as he slapped layers of mortar across a wall of tires, hiding its past as rubbery waste abandoned on the streets of Bogota.

Agence France-Presse

Bill Gates drinks cup of water that used to be human poop (VIDEO)

RT.com, January 07, 2015

Screenshot from YouTube user thegatesnotes

Billionaire activist Bill Gates is backing an innovation in water filtration that turns human poop into drinking water. The OmniProcessor could bring clean water to millions of people and help solve the problem of debilitating diseases.

The OmniProcessor, designed and built by Seattle engineering firm Janicki Bioenergy, burns human waste to produce electricity and water. The processor powers itself through the use of a steam engine and does not emit an odor. The machine could handle 14 tons of waste from 100,000 people, producing up to 86,000 liters of drinkable water a day, and net 250 kw of electricity.

At a demonstration of the OmniProcessor shown on GatesNotes, a smiling Bill Gates drank water from the machine, which was previously untreated sewage.

“It’s water,” said Gates in the video.

He wrote on his blog: "The water tasted as good as any I’ve had out of a bottle. And having studied the engineering behind it, I would happily drink it every day. It’s that safe."

Gates said that 2.5 billion people – or 40 percent of the global population – have no access to safe sanitation, and many people use facilities that do not safely dispose of human waste. About 1.5 million children die every year from contaminated food and water, and half of all patients in hospitals are there because of problems with water and sanitation. It is extremely costly to try and create sewage infrastructure in cities and towns that already exist, so Gates thinks the low cost water treatment machine could be revolutionary.

Screenshot from YouTube user thegatesnotes

“If you can get thousands of these things out there, then you’ve ensured the people really will grow up in a healthy way,” Gates told Wired. “They’ll live much higher quality lives. You will save a lot of lives. And you’ll have local entrepreneurs who are maintaining these things.”

The OmniProcessor, which costs $1.5 million, will undergo a pilot launch in Dakar, Senegal later this year.

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"2013 - What Now ?" – Jan 6, 2013 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Text version)

“… New ideas are things you never thought of. These ideas will be given to you so you will have answers to the most profound questions that your societies have had since you were born. Inventions will bring clean water to every Human on the planet, cheaply and everywhere. Inventions will give you power, cheaply and everywhere. These ideas will wipe out all of the reasons you now have for pollution, and when you look back on it, you'll go, "This solution was always there. Why didn't we think of that? Why didn't we do this sooner?" Because it wasn't time and you were not ready. You hadn't planted the seeds and you were still battling the old energy, deciding whether you were going to terminate yourselves before 2012. Now you didn't…. and now you didn't.

It's funny, what you ponder about, and what your sociologists consider the "great current problems of mankind", for your new ideas will simply eliminate the very concepts of the questions just as they did in the past. Do you remember? Two hundred years ago, the predictions of sociologists said that you would run out of food, since there wasn't enough land to sustain a greater population. Then you discovered crop rotation and fertilizer. Suddenly, each plot of land could produce many times what it could before. Do you remember the predictions that you would run out of wood to heat your homes? Probably not. That was before electricity. It goes on and on.

So today's puzzles are just as quaint, as you will see. (1)How do you strengthen the power grids of your great nations so that they are not vulnerable to failure or don't require massive infrastructure improvement expenditures? Because cold is coming, and you are going to need more power. (2) What can you do about pollution? (3) What about world overpopulation? Some experts will tell you that a pandemic will be the answer; nature [Gaia] will kill off about one-third of the earth's population. The best minds of the century ponder these puzzles and tell you that you are headed for real problems. You have heard these things all your life.

Let me ask you this. (1) What if you could eliminate the power grid altogether? You can and will. (2) What if pollution-creating sources simply go away, due to new ideas and invention, and the environment starts to self-correct? (3) Overpopulation? You assume that humanity will continue to have children at an exponential rate since they are stupid and can't help themselves. This, dear ones, is a consciousness and education issue, and that is going to change. Imagine a zero growth attribute of many countries - something that will be common. Did you notice that some of your children today are actually starting to ponder if they should have any children at all? What a concept! ….”

Jakarta Passes Sweeping Waste Management Regulation

Jakarta Globe, Lenny Tristia Tambun, May 21, 2013

Scavengers collect recyclable plastics at Bantargebang garbage dump
in Bekasi, West Java on March 29. (EPA Photo/Mast Irham)

A new regulation in Jakarta imposes fines of up to Rp 50 million ($5,120) on illegal dumping, while also implementing stricter mandates on eco-friendly bags, biodegradable packaging, littering and waste management.

Unu Nurdin, the head of the Jakarta Cleanliness Office, said the new rule, approved by the Jakarta Legislative Council on Tuesday, mandates that rubbish be put in designated locations and companies manage their waste, especially that which can lead to pollution and environmental degradation.

“If residents and companies do not meet their obligations, as arranged in the regulations, they will face sanctions. The sanctions range from administrative ones to fines of between Rp 500,000 to Rp 50 million,” Unu said after a plenary meeting of the City Council.

Article 126 of the regulation prohibits dumping waste into waterways and water reservoirs, streets, parks and public areas. It also says that waste must be disposed in integrated waste dumps (TPST) and final dump sites (TPA) between 6 a.m to 9 p.m.

“It is also prohibited to dispose waste at the TPST or TPA without a permit, burn waste that pollutes the environment, throw waste from a vehicle, use parts of streets as temporary waste dumps, manage waste that leads to pollution or environmental degradation,” Unu said.

Neighborhood units known as Rukun Warga were also given the authority to slap administrative sanctions on those households which fail to separate their waste into organic and inorganic.

Those responsible over the management of residential, commercial, industrial and other special areas, who are found negligent in providing facilities for waste management will also incur administrative sanctions and fines of between Rp 10 million to Rp 50 million.

Operators of public and social facilities which fail to provide facility for waste separation will incur administrative sanctions and fines of between Rp 1 million to Rp 5 million.

Manufacturers which fail to display matters related to reducing waster or waste handling on their packaging, or use packaging that cannot naturally decompose, may face administrative sanctions as well as fines of Rp 25 million to Rp 50 million.

Shopping center operators who do not use environmentally-friendly shopping bags will also face administrative sanctions as well as fine of between Rp 5 million and Rp 25 million.

“The governor can issue administrative sanctions, including fines, on individuals who intentionally dump waste outside of the allowed time, of up to Rp 100,000,” Uno said.

Litterers, including dumping waste into water ways and reservoirs, on the streets, in parks or in public areas, face a fine of Rp 500,000

Those caught littering from vehicles will also face the same fine. Salvagers working on piles or mounds of waste can also face a fine of a similar amount if they spread the waste.

“These fines will be sent to the regional treasury in line with the regulations and laws. We want the public to be waste conscious, so that we can also reduce floods in Jakarta,” he said.

118 Tanjung Priok Containers Confirmed to Contain Toxic Waste

Jakarta Globe, Fidelis Satriastanti, April 05, 2012

Four Indonesian companies imported a total of 118 containers in February,
which were confirmed on Thursday to contain hazardous materials
commonly referred to as B3 waste here. (Antara Photo)

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• Global Ban on Exports of Toxic Waste Advances

Indonesia’s Ministry of Environment confirmed on Thursday that 118 containers of scrap metal seized at Tanjung Priok port in North Jakarta in February contained hazardous materials.

They are the second batch of scrap metal containers imported into Indonesia that have been proven to contain toxic waste.

The first batch, consisting of 113 containers and arriving in the same port in January, was confirmed in February to contain hazardous materials, commonly referred to as B3 here.

“We’ve conducted some samplings and testing, and the result is the same with the 113 containers. The 118 containers are contaminated with B3 waste,” said Henry Bastaman, the deputy for technical support development and capacity building at the Environment Ministry in Jakarta on Thursday.

“The type of waste materials found are similar with those in the 113 containers. There is oil, electronic waste, chromium and lead.”

Henry said the 118 containers were imported by four Indonesian companies and registered as scrap metal for recycling purposes.

The ministry’s deputy for environmental management, Sudariyono, said last month the 118 containers came from a number of countries in Europe, Asia and Africa, and would be returned to those countries soon after administrative procedures were completed.

The 113 containers in the first batch, meanwhile, came from Britain and the Netherlands, and are expected to soon be sent back to those two countries.

Indonesia’s customs and excise office also seized 130 containers in Surabaya, 77 containers in Medan and 11 containers in Semarang believed to contain toxic waste.

BeritaSatu/JG

Dutch accused of dumping chemicals in Jakarta

RNW, 29 January 2012

Indonesia's Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo has accused the Netherlands and the United Kingdom of violating the Basel Convention against the dumping of chemical waste.

The minister told reporters on Saturday that customs had impounded 113 containers of hazardous and toxic waste at the port of Tanjung Priok in Jakarta, according to a report in the Jakarta Post.

The Dutch and British governments "should have reported the shipments to Indonesia because they contained hazardous and toxic waste" under the terms of the Basel agreement, which has been in force since 1992. The 89 British and 24 Dutch containers contained mainly scrap metal contaminated with poisonous chemicals.

The Jakarta government has said it will notify the British and Dutch embassies of the find, demanding an explanation for the incompleteness of the shipload's documents. The owner of the PT HHS company which attempted to import the scrap metal into Indonesia could face a 15-year jail sentence if found guilty, Environment Minister Balthasar Kombuaya said.

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The customs office foiled the attempted smuggling of 28,200 kilograms
of scrap steel allegedly contaminated by hazardous waste at the Tanjung
Priok Port on Saturday in Jakarta. (Antara Photo/Ujang Zaelani)

Indonesian Garbage Project Helps to Save the Climate

Jakarta Globe, Christiane Oelrich, January 01, 2012

A man perches on a makeshift raft on a river covered with trash as he
 searches for materials to recycle, north of Indonesia's capital, Jakarta
 in this file photo. Residents in Tangerang are taking trash collection into
their own hands. (Reuters Photo/Supri) 

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Tangerang. Crouched and concentrated, August and Karma rip open knotted plastic bags at the foot of a big pile of rubbish.

Yoghurt cups, paper packaging, plastic, pineapple rinds, cabbage leaves, chicken bones and the like fall out. The young Indonesian men begin sorting. Organic material goes to one side, and bottles, plastic and paper to the other.

“A super job,” remarks Karma, 23. “Finally, reliable work.” The two sort their rubbish and that of their neighbors, too. For the past year, the 325 families in Griya Serpong — a working class housing area of Tangerang, a city some 40 kilometers south-west of Jakarta — have been disposing of their garbage themselves.

Municipal garbage collection was never reliable, and the residents used to dump their refuse in a vacant field — a paradise for rats, flies, mosquitoes and snakes.

Everything is different now. The roofed garbage sorting facility is a source of local pride.

“It’s got a lot cleaner here,” notes Ulil Albab, the project’s honorary chairman.

“Nobody wanted to have anything to do with rubbish before. Now we bring school kids here and show them how to compost,” Karma says.

Residents built the facility with the help of BEST, a local non-governmental organization focusing on urban poverty and community development, and BORDA (Bremen Overseas Research and Development Association), a German non-profit organization that aims to improve the living conditions of disadvantaged communities and to keep the environment intact.

At a monthly cost per family of 12,000 Indonesian rupiahs, or a little over 1 dollar, August and Karma sweep through the alleyways of Griya Serpong with their moped and trailer every day collecting garbage — 400 kilograms of it.

They compost all organic refuse at the sorting facility. It is then sold along with the plastic, glass and paper.

Agathe, 35, has made a business out of rubbish. She collects discarded detergent and noodle bags. She and her girlfriends fashion colorful handbags and wallets from them.

When everything of value has been separated out of the housing area’s refuse, no more than 30 percent remains. It is taken to a tip.

BEST Director Hamzah Harun Al Rasyid is pleased. “It’s a win-win situation,” he says. “The housing area is cleaner, there are new jobs, and there is considerably less rubbish, so we’re reducing methane emissions from the garbage tips.”

Karma and August constantly turn over the compost pile, which aerates it. This helps prevent the formation of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that makes garbage tips a big contributor to global warming.

As Indonesia’s population grows rapidly, so do the piles of garbage that are produced by the country’s more than 240 million inhabitants.

While recycling is a booming industry — for example in Germany, where it generates some 67 billion dollars in revenues annually — almost all of the Indonesian garbage is incinerated or dumped in open tips.

About 1.8 million tons of garbage is likely to be produced daily worldwide by 2025, according to BORDA. In Indonesia, 62 percent of the refuse is organic and could be composted. But there is no large-scale sorting of refuse.

Facilities like the one in Griya Serpong are catching on. The twenty-first one is to be inaugurated in the near future, and many other communities are clamoring for their own.

“We estimate that each facility like this reduces methane by 132 tons a year,” said Jati Kusumowati, who works at the BORDA office in the city of Yogyakarta. “We think they ought to be promoted internationally as well.” One way to do this might be via the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) set out in the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, which allows industrialized countries to meet their emission--reduction or limitation commitments in part by paying for emission cuts in developing countries.

A one-ton reduction in methane would earn about 13 to 16 dollars, according to Kusumowati.

But small projects such as the one in Griya Serpong would not clear the technical and bureaucratic hurdles necessary for them to be officially recognized. BORDA is now trying to get the requirements for small projects loosened.

DPA

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Companies, households use Malang dam as garbage dump

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta, Mon, 10/17/2011

Negligence and a lack of supervision has led Sengguruh dam in the East Java town of Malang to be used as a waste disposal site for household garbage and industrial waste, state water firm Perum Jasa Tirta says.

“Besides the industrial waste from the hundreds of companies, there has been a huge volume of household waste — about 20 to 30 cubic meters a day during the dry season, and up to 80 cubic meters a day during the rainy season,” Jasa Tirta spokesman Tri Hardjono said in Malang on Monday as quoted by Antara.

Tri added that the waste not only contaminated the water in the dam, but also made it shallower, obliging local authorities to dredge the dam every year as the local power plant relies on it for water.

Operations Begin for New Bali Plant To Purify Sewage Into Usable Water

Jakarta Globe, Made Arya Kencana, August 11, 2011

Denpasar. Bali officially began operations at a water purification facility on Wednesday that turns treated sewage into clean, usable water.

“The Balinese people are worried about predictions that the island will suffer from a water crisis in 2015,” provincial regional secretary Made Jendra said at the plant’s opening. “This, at least, will be alleviated by the operation of this facility.”

Jendra said the treatment plant, which was a joint project of the central government, Denpasar administration, Badung district government and Japan International Cooperation Agency, would be able to produce 9,000 cubic meters of clean water every day, or more than 100 liters per second.

While that figure was far from the estimated 1,500 liters per second needed to avert a water crisis in 2015, he said clean water production would hopefully grow further with the completion of a sewage network project.

Goro Yasuda, director for overseas projects at Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transportation and Tourism, said Bali would face a water crisis by 2015 because “the need for clean water vastly exceeds the capacity of the regional water company.”

Dewa Punia Asa, head of Bali’s public works office, said that so far only 8,647 households in Denpasar and Badung districts were linked to the first phase of the Denpasar Sewage Development Project. Those households are estimated to produce about 22,000 cubic meters of liquid waste a day.

A second phase, expected to be completed in 2014, is targeting 7,200 new connections, mostly hotels and restaurants in the tourist areas of Sanur, Kuta, Legian and Seminyak.

Tjok Bagus Budiana, who heads the province’s sewage management service, said the facility was designed to process as much as 51,000 cubic meters of liquid waste per day. It is built on a 17.5 hectare plot, 2.5 hectares of which is reserved for reservoirs to hold liquid waste.

He said households had to pay a monthly fee of Rp 15,000 to Rp 25,000 ($1.75 to $2.90) to be connected to the network. The fee, he added, would be higher for participating businesses.

Cideng operates water recycling system

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Wed, 04/07/2010 11:01 AM

JAKARTA: Cideng subdistrict in Central Jakarta has established a water recycling system, enabling it to reuse wastewater from 44 food street vendors around the area.

They use a technology called the Ecotechnology Park that separates poisonous and dangerous substances in waste so it no longer poses a threat to the environment.

Cideng subdistrict head Siti Nurbaiti said the liquid waste management system could produce 12 cubic meters of clean water and save on water costs.

“Now we have wastewater management we depend on recycled water to irrigate plants around the district,” she said Tuesday as quoted by beritajakarta.com. — JP

Household waste spoils Pamurbaya’s beauty

Indra Harsaputra, The Jakarta Post, Surabaya | Fri, 03/19/2010 9:47 AM

Full of garbage: Plastic trash litters the mangrove forest in eastern Surabaya. The garbage is dumped by people living along the Surabaya River. (JP/Indra Harsaputra)

Early in 2010, Surabaya Mayor Bambang Dwi Hartono inaugurated a conservation and ecotourism zone on the eastern coast of Surabaya known as Pamurbaya.

However, it is hard work changing the habits of local people who are used to dumping rubbish into a nearby river, covering the coastline with plastic waste.

Dimas, a photographer working for the East Java Traveler magazine, was amazed to see the coastal scenery at sundown. “It’s a fascinating view. I could see an expanse of mangrove trees along the shore, glowing in yellowish hues in the setting sun,” he told The Jakarta Post recently.

He visited Pamurbaya with a group of journalists and several researchers from the Foundation for Nature Conservation and Education (Yapeka), which has partnered with the Surabaya city administration to develop Pamurbaya.

But the natural beauty of Pamurbaya has been spoiled — as Dimas discovered — by heaps of garbage in the coastal areas where the Surabaya River empties into the sea.

“I’m longing to enjoy the Surabaya landscape without rubbish. I thought this conservation area was free from waste, yet it’s not far different from the city’s garbage-strewn traditional markets,” he added.

The accumulation of waste causes the death of some full-grown mangroves as it hampers sunlight penetration and interferes with the process of oxygen absorption by their roots. Besides, plastic swathing frequently stops the growth of shoots at the base of the trees, thus slowing down mangrove regeneration.

Executive director of Ecological Observation and Wetlands Conservation (Ecoton), Prigi Arisandi, said Pamurbaya’s natural environment had changed since the Surabaya administration issued its Regional Regulation No.23/1993, turning the coast into a development zone. Its mangrove forests and brackish water ponds were converted into settlements.

“Shortly after the regulation was announced, this zone was transformed into a housing area complete with shopping facilities and schools. So far, many housing developers have been attracted to building housing complexes on the waterfront,” noted Prigi.

Prigi added that housing construction prompted local people to use vacant land for business and settlement purposes following sedimentation in Pamurbaya, since the width of the area increased by between 2 and 4 kilometers from 1986 to 1996.

This land reclamation has endangered the existence of several wildlife species in Pamurbaya. The coastal birds now under the threat of extinction include egrets, sandpipers, plovers, and white eyes.

“Moreover, the increasing waste along the river basins of Brantas in Malang, Kediri, Mojokerto and Surabaya combined with the lack of public awareness on the need to avoid the disposal of garbage into rivers has posed a serious problem to the Pamurbaya zone,” he indicated.

Bambang said that to promote the restoration of Pamurbaya’s mangrove forest, the city administration had for two years made various conservation efforts, including the formulation of a regional regulation on the Surabaya spatial layout plan (RTRW), in which Pamurbaya was designated as a conservation zone.

“The RTRW rule serves as the regional government’s tool to save mangrove land from housing development. From 1972 to 2009, Pamurbaya’s land area expanded by 176 hectares, which private circles are now eagerly eyeing for settlement,” he pointed out.

Bambang revealed that before the endorsement of the regulation, the National Land Affairs Agency (BPN) had been requested not to issue certificates for housing construction and ownership in the new areas formed by sedimentation in Pamurbaya, while a proposal was forwarded to the Office of the State Minister for Environment Affairs to make Pamurbaya a protected mangrove zone.

The proposed protected zone covers almost 2,500 hectares. Of the area, around 50 hectares in three districts, Rungkut, Gununganyar and Sukolilo, will be the core zone of conservation, almost 390 hectares will serve as a buffer zone and close to 430 hectares will become a cultivation zone.

Meanwhile, 1,585 hectares in Keputih sub-district, Sukolilo, are still under study.

According to him, several programs related to the low public awareness of proper garbage disposal practices would continue to be implemented. On top of preventing erosion, expanding urban green space and increasing the catch of local fishermen, Pamurbaya’s mangrove forest is also richer in biodiversity than most conservation areas in Southeast Asia.

Pamurbaya, for instance, has 15 natural mangrove species. In fact, Muara Angke Wildlife Reserve in Jakarta only has six species and Sungei Buloh Conservation Zone in Singapore only nine species of mangroves.

A researcher from Yapeka, Ahmad Suwandi, said Pamurbaya had also become the habitat of 53 species of insects, 83 species of birds, including migratory birds passing from New Zealand to Siberia, and seven species of primates.

“These Pamurbaya primates are interesting to note as many other mangrove forests usually have just one to two species. In Pamurbaya, I can still see long tailed monkeys hunting with their tails,” he continued. They put their tails into water and when crabs pinch, the tails are jerked up and the crabs are caught. “It’s very natural, far from imitating human behavior,” he added.

Suwandi acknowledged that in spite of the various constraints, the local government’s intention to develop Pamurbaya into a conservation zone constituted an advanced step to reduce the impact of global warming.

Head of the Surabaya City Planning Agency Tri Rismaharini said a regional budget of Rp 3 billion would be provided for the establishment of a Mangrove Information Center in Pamurbaya to show the regional administration’s commitment to nature conservation.

The Mangrove Information Center (MIC) planned to be developed in East Java is on the same lines as has been promoted in Bali to support the island’s mangrove ecosystem.

Indonesia Takes Tough Stand Over Exports of Toxic Trash

Jakarta Globe, Fidelis E Satriastanti, February 24, 2010

Kino, an electronics repairman, right, and his brother restoring a damaged television on Monday. E-waste will rise dramatically in the developing world within a decade, a recent UN study said. (Reuters Photo/Enny Nuraheni)

Nusa Dua, Bali. As wealthy countries eye developing ones as dumping grounds for their hazardous waste, little has been done by the Indonesian government 16 years since it ratified the international chemical waste treaty.

The agreement, also known as the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal, seems to have been forgotten amid challenging climate change issues.

The State Ministry for the Environment said Indonesia had turned away a US shipment of hazardous waste at Tanjung Mas port in Semarang in November. The vessel was carrying nine containers of cathode ray tubes. The incident was widely reported abroad, but received little coverage by local news media.

CRT is a vacuum tube found mostly in computer and television sets. They are classified as hazardous under the Basel Convention.

Yuyun Ismawati, director of the BaliFokus Foundation, a Bali-based environmental group, said the Basel Convention was crucial because it was Indonesia’s only legal platform to prohibit dangerous waste from entering the country.

“The US containers case in November is a good example of how important this convention is,” Yuyun said.

She said that of the 22 official ports in the country, Batam and Wakatobi in Sulawesi were the main entry points for such materials from overseas.

Reports from the convention’s signatory nations suggest that there are at least 8.5 million tons of hazardous waste moving between countries each year.

Yuyun said to keep the archipelago from becoming a dumping ground for developed nations, the government must first ensure Indonesians understand the Basel accord.

“The convention is producing guidance in mostly complicated terms that commoners find hard to understand,” she said.

The Basel Convention, signed in 1989, was initially criticized by environmentalists for being too lenient. Activists, particularly those from Africa, called for a complete ban on the export of hazardous chemicals.

In 1995, the agreement was amended to mandate a complete ban, but was not legally binding because major signatories, such as Japan and the United States, refused to ratify it. Only 68 of the 172 signatory nations signed the amendment.

Imam Hendargo, the Environment Ministry’s deputy for the management of hazardous substances and waste, said there were difficulties in monitoring waste coming into the country, citing a lack of resources.

“And it is not that easy to monitor our vast coastal areas,” Imam said.

Jim Puckett, executive director of the Basel Ban Network, applauded the government for turning down the shipment in November.

He added, however, that the United States would not been penalized. “But this sends a strong signal back to the United States. Environmental protection agencies across the whole region are freaking out.”

He said that while all eyes were on climate-change issues, no one wanted to live in a contaminated world, where birth defects and cancer become epidemic.

“If we save ourselves from the climate but keep on contaminating our environment, it’s the same. We can’t ignore these issues while we work on climate change issues,” he said.