Eco Kids has so far focused on the wide range of activities undertaken by Junior Eco Clubs around the country, like cleaning up litter and recycling. This month, we look at one environmental issue that's becoming a very serious problem in Japan: coping with growing heaps of garbage. The way trash is collected and disposed of differs from one local government to another. So we'll take the example of Tokyo to highlight some of the problems associated with waste disposal.

Tokyo is the capital of Japan and is the most heavily populated of the country's 47 prefectures with 11.77 million residents. Tokyo stretches east-west, and its political, economic, and industrial activities are concentrated in the 23 wards near Tokyo Bay.

Collection
The way trash is collected outside the 23 wards is determined by each municipality. Within the central 23 wards, meanwhile, trash that can be incinerated (kitchen waste, paper, wood) is collected three times a week, while metals, glass, ceramics, plastics, rubber, and other nonflammable garbage are collected once a week.

Large items, like bicycles and furniture, are collected separately twice a month when individual households request to have them hauled away.

In fiscal 1997, some 5.53 million tons of waste were collected in Tokyo. The volume has been decreasing slightly since 1990, thanks to stepped up recycling efforts. And additional efforts are now being made to further reduce the volume of waste.

Recycling
Since April 1997 clear plastic bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) have been collected separately by the Tokyo metropolitan government at collection boxes in supermarkets, liquor stores, and convenience stores. As of June 1998, 4,238 stores in the 23 wards were cooperating with this initiative.

Since June 1997, moreover, a new policy aimed at boosting recycling has been implemented in certain sections of central Tokyo. Instead of collecting waste for incineration three times a week, the government collects burnable trash just twice, and once a week it now collects three types of recyclable "resources": paper (newspapers, magazines, and cardboard boxes), bottles, and cans. The Tokyo government says it hopes to launch such initiatives over a wider area in the future.

Nationwide, some 15 million tons of paper were collected in fiscal 1996, a recycling rate of 51.6%. The 1996 figure for steel cans was 1.1 million tons, a recycling rate of 77.3%, and 190,000 tons for aluminum cans, a rate of 70.2%. Some 7.9 billion bottles were collected the same year, a recovery rate of 49%.

As for PET bottles, some 179 tons were being collected every month in Tokyo as of October 1997, an 18.1% recycling rate. The collected bottles are sorted, crushed into powder, and cleaned before being turned into other materials, like clothing and stationery goods.

The paper collected in the 23 wards, meanwhile, is jointly processed by the ward and prefectural governments and turned into toilet paper or facial tissues, which have been on the market since October 1995.

Waste Treatment
The burnable trash collected from households and offices in the 23 wards are taken to one of 18 plants in Tokyo for incineration. The ash that remains is then taken to landfills in Tokyo Bay. The nonflammable trash is first taken to treatment plants, where iron and aluminum are removed, and then taken to landfills.

The large items that are collected separately from households are first crushed and then have their iron contents removed. The parts that can be burned are incinerated, while the remaining nonflammable items are sent to landfills.