109 Chiayi County Open Burning Prevention Plan
Absrtact |
Plan Name: 2020 Chiayi County Open Burning Prevention Plan
Implementation Period: January 14, 2020 to December 31, 2020
Plan Funding:NT$6,380,000
Plan Director: Lin,Hung-Pin
Execution Staff: Plan Manager Hsu Wen-Pang, plan engineers Chen Ke-Yu, Chen Tai-Chia, and Liu Mei-Ling, along with a temporary team of 12 people during the rice harvesting period.
The Plan is named the 2020 “Chiayi County Open Burning Prevention Plan.” The goal of the Plan is to provide technical and human resources to carry out open burning inspection and control, education and promotion, and other related prevention work effectively. The end-of-period report covers the period from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2020 (including the window period from January 1, 2020 to January 13, 2020). The following is a summary of the status of each task during the execution of the Plan:
1.Prohibition and Control Operation of Open Burning
(1)According to statistics from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2020, a total of 719 open burning cases were investigated and disposed of, including 79 petitions for investigation, 388 petitions for review, 178 proactive patrol inspections and 74 referrals.
(2)The Plan tackled a total of 719 open burning cases, of which 588 were open burning cases with evidence detected on site (burning or burned out). On average, approximately 1.6 cases were reported daily. The analysis of the open burning reporting time shows that the cases were mainly reported in the afternoon (12-18 pm), accounting for 67%, followed by the morning hours (6-12 am), accounting for 28%. In addition, weekdays (530 cases) outnumbered holidays (58 cases), accounting for 90.1% and only 9.9% respectively.
(3)In terms of rural municipalities, of the 588 open burning cases discovered in the Plan, Minxiong Township had the highest number of 130 cases (22.1%), followed by Shuishang Township and Xingang Township, 89 cases (15.1%) compared with 64 cases (10.8%). The relevant information has been entered in the Geographic Information System (GIS).
(4)According to the analysis of the types of burned materials in the 588 open burning cases discovered under the Plan, residents of the County mostly burned plants_other things, with 184 cases, among which the burning of weeds on vacant land was the most common (70%), followed by the burning of tree branches and leaves (178 cases). In addition, there were as many as 151 cases of burning solid waste and urban garbage (accounting for 26% of the total discovered cases). If we cross-reference the types of burned materials to the rural municipalities, the burning of “tree branches and leaves” and the burning of “plants and other things” both ranked first in Minxiong Township, with 46 and 47 cases respectively while the burning of “solid waste_other” things was more severe in Minxiong Township (18 cases), Xingang Township (17 cases) and Shuishang Township (16 cases).
(5)By December 31, 2020, 588 open burning cases had been investigated. In 148 of these cases, the fire was directly extinguished during the burning. The total control area reached 93,871 m2, and the control volume reached 2,044 m3. The reduction of open burning by the control plan in 2020 was TSP_6191.5 kg, PM10_6156.9 kg, PM2.5_5577.1 kg, SOX _226.3 kg, and NOX _1904.2 kg.
(6)Since 2018, the Plan has been working with local environmental volunteers and colleges and universities to promote and establish open burning patrol teams. At present, the Open Burning Report Group has 78 members. A total of 171 cases had been reported to date, including 84 cases in 2020.
(7)After the first and second rice crops were harvested, the Plan conducted surveys on the movement of the rice straws (removal, reuse, tillage and burial, or open burning). A total of 68,737 surveys were completed on paddy fields (18,007.7 hectares), and 2,843 surveys were conducted on dry fields (726.9 hectares) in 2020. Most of the farmers cooperated with the decay and decomposition measures, turning the soil on their farmlands and burying the rice straws (98.9%). A total of 58 farmlands with burn marks (0.09%) were found in the two rice crops, and official letters were already sent to the landowners to clarify responsibilities for contamination. Moreover, the proportion of area without open burning reached over 99% in both rice crops, which shows that the County's control measures had been effective.
2.Open Burning E-monitoring
(1)The Plan has installed surveillance facilities at vantage points. The County originally had 8 surveillance cameras. In 2020, the Plan team assisted the County in the installation of 16 new surveillance cameras and one mobile time-lapse camera, all of which have been working. Statistics for 2020 recorded 21 open burning cases detected through the vantage-point surveillance facilities, but no perpetrators were found when inspectors arrived. Subsequently, the landowners were found through cadastral inquiry and required to explain. For more information, please refer to Section 4.3.1, Chapter 4.
(2)The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was deployed 13 times for patrol during the two rice crops. The areas covered by the UAV were the main rice cultivation areas in the County, including Puzi City, Taibao City, Lucao Township, Xingang Township, and Minxiong Township. One case of open burning was detected during the period.
(3)The Plan also used the satellites to spot fire points. In 2020, 55 cases were reported by the fire point information platform. Because the satellite information was not real-time, no open burning was found in 35 of the 55 reports received by the Plan despite the clear location coordinates. The detection rate decreased 12 percentage points from 2019 (48%) to 2020 (36%). It is worthwhile to bring this matter to the attention of the responsible staff at the Environmental Protection Administration and suggest that the misclassified cases of high-temperature equipment, such as combustion towers, in industrial areas should be removed to improve the detection rate.
3.Measures to Promote the Reuse of Rice Straws
(1)The Plan set up one rice straw mat weaving machine in Central Village, Minxiong Township and one in Dingcaiyuan, Xingang Township on January 29, 2019 (as shown in Figure 4.4.1-1, Page 78), and established a community rice straw mat weaving farm. At present, 30-50 rolls of rice straw mats can be produced per day. Each roll is 100 m2, about 20 kg, and the selling price is NT$500. The size and length can be customized.
(2)The Plan team visited Minxiong Township Farmers' Association on March 3, 2020 and asked the Farmers' Association to facilitate a pilot project on pineapple fields, with an area of about 200 square meters, in Minxiong Township. In the May experiment, rice straw mats were laid on top of the pineapple fields to replace the existing black net as a sun blocker, and then in early November, the experiment used rice straw mats to replace the plastic sheeting as a weed inhibitor in the bottom of the pineapple fields. After the experiments, the fruit farmers said that using rice straw mats was more laborious and time-consuming, and that the rice straw mats laid on the pineapple fields were not an effective sun blocker, rendering the fruits prone to sunburn. The rice straw mats would be displaced or even destroyed by the elements, such as wind and rain, so the pineapple farmers needed to replenish rice straws frequently. Not only the person-hour but also the relative labor cost increased. As far as the weed inhibitor is concerned, the rice straw mats in the bottom of the pineapple fields failed to suppress weed growth. Furthermore, the cost of the rice straw mat was evaluated to be three times higher than that of the original method, which lessened the willingness of farmers to use the rice straw mat and made the implementation more difficult. The Plan team turned to watermelon farmers in Shuishang Township for the same experiment, laying rice straw mats in watermelon fields to suppress weeds. The farmers indicated that the rice straw mat was not a good mulch, but that they could lay loose rice straws for watermelon vines to climb. They would collect rice straws in the nearby farmlands for repurposing by themselves.
(3)The Plan team held a seminar, “Promotion of Community Participation in the Reuse of Agricultural Waste (Rice Straws) and Demonstration of Probiotic Fertilizers”, on November 27, 2020, with 127 attendees in total. This activity disposed of rice stalks in about two hectares of farmland, reused 10,000 kg of rice straws and reduced 852 kg of
|
---|---|
Keyword |
Open Burning Prevention Plan
|