The burning question of household waste in China

Dirty work, but environmentally friendly

Xin Xiaobo never thought he could live with waste and also enjoy a clean environment.

The 33-year-old, from Changzhou, Jiangsu province, works at a household waste incineration plant, in Jianhu, a village in Changzhou. Although he is now a departmental manager, when he started at the plant, Xin was given a basic job.

"In 2010, I operated a huge metal claw that tossed and raked the waste, which was piled up like mountains in a large storage area about 20 meters deep," he said.

"Waste incineration is different from how I thought it would be before I started working here — maybe most people don't understand the steps," he added. "It's not just about dumping the waste into incinerators. There are many steps involved to make it cleaner."

Household waste is transported to the plant, operated by China Everbright International, every day. First, it is dumped into a large storage area, where engineers mix it together from one end to the other, bit by bit, which helps the decomposition process and makes it easier to burn, he said.

Decomposition takes about three days in summer, but the number rises to seven during winter when the temperature drops.

"Each claw can hold more than 4 metric tons of waste, which is brought from the bottom of the pile (where the temperature is higher) to the very top, close to the mouth of the incinerator."

The storage unit is hermetically sealed to prevent the discharge of malodorous gases, he said.

Xin began working at the plant because he lived nearby and had never encountered any problems: "I wasn't worried about the pollution because I didn't notice any smelly gas or dust unless I thought about it. Since I started working here it doesn't bother me anymore."

He still remembers how a deputy manager drank a cup of processed leachate waste in front of visitors to prove that the water discharged by the plant is safe.

Xin has encouraged his neighbors to join the team.

"Although the job is related to waste, it has promising future because the city needs us, so there's plenty of business," he said. "We contribute to the improvement of the environment — it's very satisfying work."