Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
maybe even more rapidly if swamp conditions prevail year-round. Problems
of methane gas and fill settling are believed to be eliminated through virtu-
ally total biological degradation and total physical consolidation due to the
wetted conditions.
The proposed scheme of refuse filling should be quite beneficial in terms
of environmental impacts, primarily because the only known way to solve
“sanitation mess” problems in low-lying areas is to fill them in, and use of
refuse is often the only affordable approach.
•
The solid waste disposal/swamp reclamation scheme could reduce overall
municipal solid waste management costs by a significant reduction in haul-
ing costs and reduction in expansion requirements for the existing series of
landfill operations.
•
URBAN AIR POLLUTION CONTROL
Background
In the United States, the regulatory control system established by U.S. EPA for
point source control (industries) is effective because its regulations are enforced,
so it is cheaper to comply than to evade, and the major remaining problem is
control of pollution emission from vehicles. The regulations for vehicles (use of
exhaust emission controls, requirements for better mileage) have made significant
progress, but the eventual solution will probably be switching the fuel from
gasoline to hydrogen.
The problem in most DCs is relatively very poor; hence, many of the major DC
cities suffer from severe air pollution. The DCs have appropriate laws/regulations,
but enforcement is generally very weak, and in addition to the major sources from
industries and vehicles, uncontrolled burning of forests, especially in Indonesia,
now is a major pollutant. The pollution from the annual burning in Indonesia now
causes prolonged pollution every year in the nearby countries of Singapore and
Malaysia, and despite a major effort by ADB to help the Indonesian government to
resolve this problem, significant progress has not been made.
Air pollution is now horribly severe in many of the major cities of China,
due primarily to China's dependence on burning of coal as the primary energy
source, and it seems unlikely that China will get around to use of sequestering of
CO
2
from coal burning in the foreseeable future. And this problem, already so
severe, is now being compounded by the recent great increase in vehicle traffic
in China cities now underway.
Thailand: General Situation
One of the better (less bad) situations on air pollution control in Asian DCs
is that in Thailand where the government's Pollution Control Department has
achieved significant reductions in reducing vehicle pollution by enforcement
for reducing emission with periodic inspections, ban on use of leaded gasoline,
