30 – Implementing Industrial Symbiosis to reduce pollution in Chinese resource dependent cities: the case of Guiyang

Guiyang is a large urban area located in southwest China, and the capital of Guizhou province. The economy of the city is based on mining and material process industry, and is therefore highly dependent on natural resources exploitation. Guiyang is considered a resource-dependent city by the Chinese government who appointed it as a pilot for circular economy practices implementation in 2005. Main industries included in the area are power plants, iron and steel and aluminium industries, coal chemical and phosphorous chemical producers.

The main challenge that led the national and local government starting to plan the transition of Guiyang city towards a more sustainable model is the need to increase environment protection. Heavy industries contribute to local welfare by creating jobs and improving economic conditions, but also threaten citizens’ health by generating heavy pollutants emissions and solid waste.

Several barriers have been identified for Industrial Symbiosis development in Chinese resource dependent cities. First, the cost for solid waste disposal is still relatively low in China, and investment needed to improve materials recycling often make industrial symbiosis implementation non profitable for companies. In addition, information regarding waste production and process inputs’ requirements are not collected and made available, and companies often lack of necessary mutual trust to share them.

The approach proposed to overcome such barriers is to introduce smart recycling and optimal planning of recycling routes in order to reduce investment costs related to industrial symbiosis implementation, and to involve third party facilitators applying risk management techniques in order to help companies start dialogues and securely share information.

The discovery process implemented by the facilitators in this case started with data collection regarding waste generation in the area. A survey previously conducted by the local government in order to generate a “five-years plan for Resource and Industry Integration” was used as main source, and integrated by additional surveys and focus groups. Data gathered were first validated and then used to match materials’ and energy’s supply and demand in the region, also considering resource quality evaluation. The symbiotic network was then planned integrating industrial processes and the municipality. Economic and environmental benefits deriving from such integration were then evaluated also considering transport of waste and the need for new waste treatment facilities before being presented to involved companies.

The main precondition that led to the identification of new potential exchanges in the area was the fact that the Chinese government had launched several initiatives to incentive circular economy implementation activities in resource dependent cities since 2001. In addition, conditions required for the actual implementation of identified potential exchanges are the development of new technologies in order to guarantee maximum integration between up-stream and down-stream companies as regards compatibility of recycled products, as well as the availability of funds to upgrade infrastructures and local waste management services.