The Hong Kong Government has a new, multi-prongeed solid waste management plan that maps out the city’s strategy for the next decade. It's aimed at slowing the rate at which rubbish is sent to the city’s three existing mega-dumps, which are projected to reach capacity in 2015, 2017 and 2019 unless something is done.
Unveiled by Secretary for the Environment Wong Kam-sing, Hong Kong: Blueprint for Sustainable Use of Resources 2013-2022 repackages the familiar mantra of “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” as “Use Less, Waste Less” and envisages building of at least two organic waste treatment facilities together with a large waste-to-energy incineration plant.
The rapid expansion of renewable technologies is one of the few bright spots in an otherwise bleak assessment of global progress towards low-carbon energy, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in an annual report to the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM).
“The drive to clean up the world’s energy system has stalled,” IEA executive director Maria van der Hoeven told the CEM, which brings together ministers representing countries responsible for four-fifths of global greenhouse-gas emissions.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is extending USD200 million in loans to the Dynagreen Environmental Protection Group to help small and medium-sized cities in China turn their growing mountains of solid waste into a sustainable source of renewable energy under an agreement signed on Friday in Beijing.
The French development agency's development finance agency, Proparco, is looking to invest USD10 million in RenewGen Enviro Ventures India. The announcement, carried by the Times of India, is the latest in a series of financing deals the for Bangalore-based company focusing in the waste-to-energy (WTE).
Ramky Enviro Engineers, an Indian waste management company, plans to raise USD200 million in the nation's first initial share sale to finance a power plant fueled by urban refuse.
Australia’s Wasabi Energy has paid USD5.6 million as the first installment for its 50.5 percent stake of Shanghai Shenghe New Energy Resources Science and Technology (SSNE).
The Bangkok authorities are setting up a thermal incinerator to convert rubbish into electricity. The plant at the Nong Khaem Waste Management Centre will generate 5-MW of power which will be sold to the Metropolitan Electricity Authority.
Thailand's National Innovation Agency (NIA) has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Japan's New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) for the first pilot plant for ethanol production from cassava pulp.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has agreed to provide four loans of as much as USD200 million to China Everbright International for agricultural and municipal waste-to-energy projects in China.
China's largest energy conservation company has signed agreements with China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and GE Oil & Gas to recycle waste heat created by the country's longest gas pipeline project, according to a statement co-released by the three companies.
The Greater China Infrastructure Fund has bought interests in a waste-to-power to company and a water supply company, according to Yin Lian Chen, chief investment officer of the Hong Kong-listed investment company.
Rabobank has concluded that waste from the food, agriculture and agribusiness (F&A) industry is now viewed as an asset after years of being seen as an unwanted to cost. In its new report “Don't Waste a Drop!”, the Dutch bank says it’s a paradigm shift in the view of F&A waste, transitioning from a cost to a potential revenue source.
Shanghai is now getting power from a landfill methane power plant. The Shanghai Laogang Renewable Energy plant can generate up to 110 million kilowatt-hours of electricity for the local power grid each year - or power for the equivalent of 100,000 households.
US-listed China Recycling Energy Corp (CREG) has reassured investors that a 23-MW energy recovery project is on-track for completion by the end of the year. Its subsidiary, Xi'an TCH Energy Technology Company signed a deal with Shanxi Datong Coal Group Steel to co-develop a system that recycles gas and steam from groups of blast-furnaces and converter of Shanxi Datong's metal refining plants to generate power.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is providing USD600 million for a package of green projects that will transform waste into clean energy, reduce CO2 emissions, expand eco-friendly transport, and protect fragile wetland areas in fast-growing second-tier cities in the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
The livelihoods of about a quarter of a million people who make their living picking garbage in the India capital of New Delhi are under threat as the government eyes the trash as a means to produce energy.
In a bid to tap India’s potential in the renewable energy sector, a group of Finnish cleantech companies are looking for stronger partnerships in the country, especially in the field of energy efficiency, water treatment and bio-energy.
The companies, which form Cleantech Finland, claim that their technological innovations have made them global leaders in energy efficiency, water management and bio-energy.
This report by the World Bank spells out what the world would be like if it warmed by 4 degrees Celsius, which is what scientists are nearly unanimously predicting by the end of the century, without serious policy changes.
Companies in Asia reveal expectations that regulations that could lead to rising costs for reporting and reducing GHG emissions will also be the main sources of climate-related business opportunities.
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