INGENIEUR
Waste of Positive Value
Waste of Negative Value
Table 2
Some types of papers, plastics, recyclable metals, industrial e-waste, glass,
selected green waste, etc.
Food waste, household e-waste, batteries, non-recyclable metals,
used beverage cartons (UBC), disposable diapers, fluorescent lamps,
construction wastes, other household hazardous waste etc.
Note: Glass and green waste could also be negative value; and UBC could be positive value subject to
logistic and other factors
returns while the responsibilities on other wastes
that carry negative value are neglected. In reality,
about 80% of our total wastes generated require
additional costs to deal with it instead of generating
wealth out of it. More worrying in the long run, the
WtW concept might cause unwillingness to pay for
proper waste management because people might
have the mindset that if waste is making wealth,
why should they pay for it?
Are We Focusing on the Right Issues?
While the Government has started to ban the use
of plastic straws, it is not unreasonable because it
is a world trend and many countries have banned
single use plastic straw, especially after a video
circulating showing a straw stuck in a turtle’s nose.
Nevertheless, is banning straw the only thing we
need to do? Do we have any unsolved but more
serious problems? Some other waste generated
in Malaysia are shown below.
Types of waste
Pieces per year
Fluorescent lamps 70,000,000
Phone lithium batteries 131,700,000
Disposable diapers 4,140,058,125
Plastic straws 10,930,000,000
Cigarette butts 14,125,000,000
While over 14 billion pieces of cigarette butts
are mainly littered on the streets and could also
pose a major source for ocean plastics, it is
unfortunate but a reality that 100% or more than
four billion disposal diapers are dumped into the
landfill sites in the country. These diapers are all
made of plastics, which will stay there underneath
the land for hundreds of years. What is the
difference between cigarette butts, disposable
diapers and plastic straws? Well, cigarette butts
and diapers did not go into the nostril of turtles!
Worst still, there is no system in place for
fluorescent lamps’ collection and disposal in
Malaysia, thus nearly all are also being disposed
at the landfill sites except for lamps from some
industries that are disposed to dedicated
treatment facilities along with other scheduled
waste that they have generated. Fluorescent
lamps contain mercury, and 70 million pieces
of them could release about 500kg of mercury
into our environment throughout the country.
It is undeniable that the number of fluorescent
lamps used could be less now, being replaced
by LED lamps. However, literatures show that
some LED lamps might contain arsenic, which is
also a highly hazardous substance that should
be strictly controlled in terms of its disposal. The
environmental and health impacts from mercury
or arsenic are probably thousands of time more
severe than plastic straws but we still have no
strategy to deal with it. Unfortunately, it does not
mean the problem does not exist.
We have yet to have proper frameworks or
strategies to address these problems, which so
far are not even highlighted and they remain as
problems pushed under the carpet. Why is that
so? It is mainly because these problems are not
wealth generating and they require significant
costs to deal with it. For example, florescent
lamps, classified as under mercury-contained
waste, cost of disposal could be more than
RM3,000 per tonne. There is no legal system in
place and thus, no one has obligation to bear the
costs for proper treatment and disposal. As long
as a system is not in place, even the fluorescent
lamps generated from Government buildings are
possibly all disposed to the landfill sites.
Government’s intervention to have a holistic
approach in managing all problematic waste in
the country is much needed, with the necessary
8 VOL 82 APRIL-JUNE 2020