Reference news network reported on July 3 that Japanese media said that the Japanese Ministry of Environment recently decided to raise the temporary storage limit of waste plastics in Japan and China's industrial waste treatment enterprises to double the current policy. Restrictions on the import of waste plastics in China and other places have expanded, and the storage amount of industrial waste treatment enterprises in Japan and China is approaching the upper limit. The Ministry of Environment hopes to raise the storage limit to prevent illegal disposal, but how to improve the disposal capacity of waste plastics has become an urgent task.

The "Japan Economic News" website reported on July 2 that the Japanese Ministry of Environment on June 27 summarized the draft of the provincial order that will revise some waste disposal rules. Public comments will be solicited before July 27, and it is scheduled to be implemented in late August.
The amount of plastic waste stored is currently capped at 14 days of processing capacity for industrial waste disposal companies, the report said. After the revision of the provincial order, processing enterprises certified by the autonomous bodies can store waste plastics for 28 days.

Japan has been exporting waste plastic as a renewable resource overseas, exporting about 1 million tons a year, but since China, its largest export destination, restricted the import of waste plastics, most of the waste plastic has accumulated in Japan and China, unable to deal with it in a timely manner. Southeast Asian countries have also begun to restrict plastic imports.

According to the report, industrial waste treatment companies temporarily store waste plastic on their land before incineration, but if the amount of waste plastic continues to increase, it will lead to illegal disposal or the breeding of pests, which may have a negative impact on the surrounding environment. According to the statistics of the Ministry of the Environment, the amount of waste plastic treatment varies according to different enterprises, the average daily processing capacity is several tons to dozens of tons left

Even if the amount of storage is increased, due to the lack of sufficient processing capacity, the future still needs to adjust the treatment method.

Reported that the survey carried out by the Japanese Ministry of the Environment in March showed that 12.3% of local governments confirmed that the storage volume of processing enterprises in the region exceeded the upper limit. In view of this situation, the Environment Ministry issued a notice in May requiring local governments responsible for incinerating household waste to provide assistance to enterprises in disposing of waste plastics.

The ministry is supporting enterprises to improve their processing capacity by, among other measures, increasing the 2019 budget related to waste plastic disposal by about six times the previous year. However, it is reported that it will take about two years to establish a treatment system, and the waste plastic treatment before then is a task.

Plastic Industry Video