Regarding the urban development of the five new reclamation zones, the Land, Public Works and Transport Bureau (DSSOPT) released an environmental impact assessment (EIA) report on its master plan last Friday. In light of the location’s proximity to waste disposal and treatment facilities, concerns have been raised over Zone E’s livability and the safety of its air.
As the report was based on outdated and inadequate data, the EIA has raised doubts as to whether it reflects the actual challenges of air pollution that residents might face in the area. With the possible risk of harmful airborne diseases, the public now fears the new land will turn out to be another ash-ridden Ka Ho village.
The artificial island of Zone E will host housing complexes, schools, and social facilities such as a residential care home for the elderly, and a large underground sewage plant, in addition to the existing refuse incinerator and hazardous goods processing center located 250 meters away in Taipa’s Pec On area.
The DSSOPT representatives cited the EIA study conducted by the China Academy of Urban Planning and Design, stressing that the refuse incinerator would have no impact on Zone E’s living environment. However, several indicators supporting the EIA result were criticized on the grounds that they lagged significantly behind current realities, such as the projected population increase, waste increase, and measurement standard for suspended particles.
According to the EIA report, the current refuse incinerator will be able to cope with the current amount of waste until 2020, when more land needs to be reserved for solid waste disposal.
However, the facility is expected to reach its limit sooner, as the population data used as underlying variables in the assessment was already out of date. The assessment referred to a projected population of 734,000 by 2031, which underestimated the growth rate reflected in the Policy Research Office’s latest population estimate of 750,000 by 2025.
Last year, the incinerator received an average of 1,240 tonnes of solid waste each day, treating 30 percent more waste than in the previous year. As a result, the facility’s usage was pushed to over 70 percent of its daily handling capacity.
Once the refuse incinerator reaches its limit, it will have to be expanded along with the rest of the hazardous goods processing center, as revealed by the DSSOPT. However, the expansion was not included in the calculations, whereas the measurement evaluation on pollutants also used the outdated PM10 standard instead of PM2.5.
Senior engineer, Jiang Guoxiang of the China Academy of Urban Planning and Design’s Shenzhen branch, told media that the assessment result, which identified a safe zone of 250 meters, was only based on the refuse incinerator’s current scale. He explained that the Macau authorities didn’t mention the waste facilities’ future expansion, nor did they provide assessors with the PM2.5 data apart from PM10.
Despite only assessing the master plan’s environment impact based on the refuse incinerator’s current scale and PM10 pollutant standard, the EIA report has suggested controlling buildings’ heights and densities in Zone E1 as well as increasing ventilation passages, so that residential areas’ pollutant concentration levels fall within safety standards. BY
zone a reclamation delay still uncertain
regarding the waiting time for public housing construction, due to sedimentation after the reclamation of Zone A is completed, the Infrastructure Development Office (GDI) says the new land will already be prepared for infrastructural construction and other procedures upon the completion of sand filling, as a series of geological disposal works have been laid out since the design phase to eliminate the pre-subsidence of reclaimed land. Nevertheless, the Office acknowledges Zone A’s reclamation – now underway – was delayed due to a shortage of sand. The exact length of the delay cannot be assessed until the supply issue is resolved.
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