Mobilizing private capital and know-how to turn waste into energy
Turning municipal solid waste into energy through the waste-to-energy process is one of the popular strategies of solving the rise of generated waste. It involves incinerating waste to produce energy in the form of electricity or heat. Unfortunately, lack of access to finance and a gap in technological knowledge made it difficult for cities to adopt this strategy. Hence, the government of the People’s Republic of China enacted laws and regulations between 2004 to 2007 to promote waste management and control environmental pollution and city-level public-private partnership (PPP) based on concession agreement. In addition, the Asian Development Banks in 2009 approved a $100 million long term loan to support, through PPP, the construction and operation of waste-to-energy projects in the People's Republic of China. This report shows the results of the project, which benefited approximately 18 million city dwellers, and the importance of choosing the right project sponsor in order to ensure the successful implementation of a project.