Urban Farm DB
← Research catalogue
Database research record2023·China

Four years of waste sorting leaves China's incinerators short of fuel

Li Jiacheng

Eco-Business / Dialogue Earth

Urban Farm DB summary

China's mandatory waste-sorting policy, launched in Shanghai in 2019, improved diversion and recycling but created a new problem: overbuilt waste-to-energy incineration capacity. Shanghai diverted 54% of its waste (6.46 million tonnes) in 2021, up from 21% in 2018, while the number of national incinerators grew from 130 in 2011 to 927 by 2023, pushing 2022 national overcapacity to 100.99%.

Extracted facts

6 facts

Only numbers and their conditions are stored, as structured data — never the source's own sentences. Metric and condition names stay in English, as coded.

  • 54 %↑ Increase

    diversion rate(waste sorting mandate)

    CompostControl: 21% in 2018
    region
    Shanghai, China
    year
    2021
  • 927 count↑ Increase

    facility count(incineration capacity)

    PolicyControl: 130 facilities in 2011
    region
    China
    year
    2023
  • 100.99 %

    overcapacity rate(incineration overcapacity)

    Policy
    region
    China
    year
    2022
  • 6,460,000 t

    diverted tonnage(waste sorting mandate)

    Compost
    region
    Shanghai, China
    year
    2021
  • 1,000,000 t_per_day

    daily capacity(incineration capacity)

    Policy
    region
    China
    year
    end of 2022
  • 100,650,000 t_co2e

    ghg emissions(waste to energy)

    Climate
    region
    China
    year
    2022

Direction of conclusions

Each author conclusion is recorded only as a coded direction per topic. Read the original for the conclusion itself.

  • Policy and governanceMixedWith caveats
  • Carbon / GHGMixedWith caveats

Columns citing this source

This source is cited by the columns below. This page records the connection before you continue to the external source.

Open the original source ↗