Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

ScienceDirect
Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730

International Conference on Solid Waste Management, 5IconSWM 2015

Management and Recycling of Construction Waste in Taiwan

Ying-Ying Laia , Li-Hsu Yehb, Ping-Fu Chenb, Po-Hsun SungbĭYuh-Ming Leec,*
a,
Deputy Director Department of Waste Management, Taiwan EPA, Taipei, Taiwan
Ph.D. Student, Institute of Natural Resource Management, National Taipei University
b
Sunrise Environmental Science and Technology Co., Ltd., Taiyuan, Taiwan
c
Distinguished Professor, Institute of Natural Resource Management,National Taipei University

Abstract

In recent years, due to the increase in greenhouse gas emissions causing global warming, but also lead to the world's climate
change. Carbon reduction and sustainable development has become an important topic around the world. Resource recycling can
reduce the exploitation of natural virgin materials. The building projects have been promote every year and the urban renewal plan
cause the demolition of existing buildings demolition. The average life span of buildings is 23.31 years. Most Construction waste
was belong to resources that can be utilized to renewable resources. Such as waste concrete block, steel, wood, glass, etc., can now
through the construction site to reduce, or transport to recycling factory to become resource. The recycling process can reduce
using natural materials and reduce engender the construction waste. In recent years, 2 million tons of construction waste are
generated each year in Taiwan. The Taiwan Environmental Protection Administration (TEPA) initiated the online system in 1997
to better manage tracking. After three years of testing, the Industrial Waste Control Center (IWCC) was officially established in
2000. It offers functions like online integration, mobilization, and analysis tools. The construction site was monitored from 2005.
The Construction waste must be transported to the treatment facilities. The reporting system has been improved to not only trace
the waste flow, but also to monitor the actual amount of waste generated. This paper mainly described Taiwan construction waste
management (CWM) practices and reuse status.
© 2016
© 2016TheTheAuthors.
Authors. Published
Published by Elsevier
by Elsevier B.V. B.V.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of 5IconSWM 2015.
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of 5IconSWM 2015
Keywords: Construction waste, construction waste management, treatment facilities, recycling;

1. Introduction
The life cycle of building means the period from Cradle to Grave. The life cycle process of building includes the

* Corresponding author: Distinguished Professor, Institute of Natural Resource Management, National Taipei University.
151, University Road, Sanxia District, New Taipei City, 23741, Taiwan
E-mail address: yml@mail.ntpu.edu.tw (Yuh-Ming Lee)

1878-0296 © 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of 5IconSWM 2015
doi:10.1016/j.proenv.2016.07.077
724 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730

planning of architect, design of architect, drawings of construction, construction, management of operation and
maintenance, and demolition. The types of construction waste, generated from building period the life cycle, were
aggregated as figure 1:

The division of responsibilities of CWM in Taiwan were belonged to two departments. The construction
earthwork is useful resources such as brick, tile, concrete, mud, clay, soil, sand, gravel. The construction earthwork
were not belonged to waste and managed by Construction and Planning Agency Ministry of the Interior (CPAMI).
The legislation was called “Construction earthwork treatment program”. The construction waste was belonged to
industrial waste such as wood, glass, ferrous metal, non-ferrous metal, plastics, rubber, and asphalt. The construction
waste was managed for TEPA. The legislation was called “Waste Disposal Act”.(See Figure 2)[1]

2. Construction Waste Management[2]

A policy framework for CWM in Taiwan over the past decades, a series of policies have been enacted by the
government. It has for made CWM policy framework. (See Figure 3)[2,3].

Construction Stage

Construction Construction
Construction Finish License Permit
License Permit Registration

x Construction Earthwork (Basement Excavation)

x Construction Waste (Building Construction)

x Construction Earthwork x General Waste

x Construction Waste x Construction Waste

Demolition Repair and

Demolition Decoration
License Permit Replacement

Demolition Stage Operation Stage

Fig. 1. The types of construction waste generated from building period the life cycle
 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730 725

Constuction Waste Construction earthwork

=A+B+C+D Treatment Program

Construction Waste
Recycling Management Construction earthwork
Regulation ĩŕũŦġńŰůŴŵųŶŤŵŪŰůġŢůťġőŭŢůůŪůŨġłŨŦůŤźĪ

Recycling Materials Reuse

Mixed xwood
x mud
Constructi xglass x clay
on Waste xferrous metal x brick
x soil
Waste (EPA) xnon-ferrous metal x tile
x sand
Act xplastics x concrete
x gravel
xRubber
xalsphant
Ń ń Ņ
ł
Construction Waste Reuse
ĩŕũŦġńŰůŴŵųŶŤŵŪŰůġŢůťġőŭŢůůŪůŨġłŨŦůŤźĪ Waste already separated at the work place

Waste not separated at the work place

Fig. 2. The division of responsibilities of CWM in Taiwan

P5:̏ Industrial Waste Report and

Management System̋ and ̏
Construction Waste Reuse
Management Regulations̋

P4:Construction P6:Contruction Sector

Earthwok Control Control
Center
P7:GPS Real–time
P3:Industrial Waste
Tracking System
Control Center
P2:Construction
EarthwokTreatment P8:CCTV
Program Surveillance System

P1:Waste P9: Strategy of

Disposal ConstructionWaste
Act Management

1974 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
P1: Waste Disposal Act

Fig. 3. A policy framework for CWM in Taiwan

Taiwan formulated the Waste Disposal Act (WDA) in 1974 for the effective clearance and disposal of waste,
improvement of environmental sanitation and maintenance of public health. The Act is the first special law for waste
management in Taiwan. The WDA defines classification of waste and the responsibility of clearance and disposal of
726 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730

wastes, specifies the authority and responsibility of competent authorities, and regulates the collection, storage,
clearance and disposal of wastes.

P2: Construction Earthwork Treatment Program

The “Construction Earthwork Treatment Program” was established in 1989. The program established rules related
construction earthwork treatment and aimed on the methods of temporarily store, stacked to recycle, classify, treat,
transport, and reuse.

P3: Industrial Waste Control Center

The TEPA established the IWCC in 2000 to ensure that industrial wastes are properly cleared and disposed of.
Using information systems and GPS, the center analyzed the data of industrial wastes reported online and the shipping
routes of the waste to find possible violations. TEPA then passed the case to the EPB or the TEPA’s inspectorate for
investigation.

P4: Construction Earthwork Control Center

The Taiwan CPAMI has been promoting electronic reporting and auditing system for Construction Earthwork
since2000, and it established “Construction Earthwork Control Center” and set up “Construction Earthwork Control
Center Report and Management System (CER&MS)” in 2000.

P5: “Industrial Waste Report and Management System” and “Construction Waste Reuse Management
Regulations”

The TEPA has been set up “Industrial Waste Report and Management System (IWR&MS)” in 2002.Ministry of
the interior established “Construction Waste Reuse Management Regulations” aimed on the methods of recycle and
reuse of construction waste.

P6:Construction Sector Control

The TEPA required to make online reports since 2005 that included of the engineering, construction area of
engineering is above 500 m2 or budget of engineering’s contract is above 5 million NT, and all the demolition
engineering.

P7: GPS Real–time Tracking System

The TEPAhas regulated in succession since 2007 that trucks shipping construction waste should be equipped with
global positioning system (GPS) certified by the The Taiwan EPA.

P8:CCTV Surveillance System

The TEPA required all the treatment facilities to set up closed-circuit television (CCTV) to monitor the vehicles
enter facilities and process of treatment since 2011.

P9: Strategy of Construction Waste Management

The TEPA established “Strategy of Construction Waste Management” to require central ministries and local
government to implement since 2014.

2.1A “roadmap” of CWM in Taiwan

As an overall effect of these policies, a “roadmap” of CWM in Taiwan can be illustrated in Fig. 4.Based on the “reduce,
 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730 727

reuse, and recycle(3R)” principle, the options for waste management listed in preferred order of avoidance,
minimization, recycling, treatment, and disposal have been devised. (See Fig.4)[1, 4]

2.2 Construction Earthwork Generation and Management

The construction earthwork generation could be classified to the public engineering and architectural Engineering. In
recent 5 years, the construction earthwork generation amount of public engineering was about 20-30 million tons, the
construction earthwork generation amount of architectural engineering was about 30-40 million tons, the total amount
of construction earthwork was about 40-70 million tons in Taiwan. In 2014, there are about 156 recycling facilities
156 in Taiwan and there was about 126.5 million tons of construction earthwork had been treated with. [4]

The competent authority of architectural engineering is local government. The competent authority of public
engineering is the host authority. The local government management the recycling facilities through the transport
proof document and monitor the trucks through the trace of trucks by online integration, mobilization, and analysis
tools. The construction waste should be declared to the “Construction Earthwork Information Service Center” that
was set up by CPAMI.[4]

5HF\FOLQJ 0DQPDGH
*UHHQEXLOGLQJ SODQW DJJUHJDWH /DQGILOO
HDUWKZRUN
PDWHULDO VLWHV
5HF\FOLQJ
IDFLOLWLHV
FRQVWUXFWLRQ
HDUWKZRUN VROLGZDVWH

&RQVWUXFWLRQ :DVWH
: 2QVLWH 7UHDWPHQW
0DWHULDOV ,QFLQHUDWRU
VLWHV VRUWLQJ 0L[HG IDFLOLWLHV *HQHUDOZDVWHV
PDWHULDOV
FRQVWUXFWLRQZDVWH

5HXVH

Fig. 4. Flow chart of waste disposal tracking and management

728 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730

Local Environmental
Database
Protection Bureau Taiwan
for
EPA
Industrial
Waste
Internet
Internet

Portal烉waste.epa.gov.tw Satellite
Communication
channel

Internet
Report before Waste
Shipping Offsite
Report on the
Report on the days
day of Receiving
GSM
Report On the day of of Receiving and
Waste
Waste Shipping Treating Waste

generator waste treatment Disposal site

transporter facilities
Waste Hauling GPS Monitoring
Truck System

Fig. 5. Construction waste generation and management in Taiwan[2]

2.3 Construction Waste Generation and Management

There are about 1.2-1.9 million tons per year generation of construction waste in Taiwan. The reuse ratio of
construction waste is about 64%-80%. For example, there are 64 treatment and reuse facilities and treat 14.5 million
tons in Taiwan in 2014.[5]

The TEPA established the IWCC in 2000 to ensure that industrial wastes are properly cleared and disposed of.
Using information systems and GPS, the center analyzed the data of industrial wastes reported online and the shipping
routes of the waste to find possible violations. The TEPA then passed the case to the EPB or the TEPA’s inspectorate
for investigation. Figure 5 illustrates the framework of the reporting and tracking system of industrial wastes.

3. Construction Waste Recycling

3.1 Viable technology on construction waste recycling

The treatment process of different properties of construction waste was shown on figure 6. The treatment
procedure explain as follows:[5]

(1). Primary Classification

The waste mixture civil engineering and architectural engineering should be executed pretreatment before enter
trammel screening machine. The machine separate huge trash out to avoid to block in machine. The small sand could
be separated out first through the trammel screening machine. The small sand could be stored in the temporary area
 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730 729

through conveyor.

(2)Filtered Classification
The large gravel materials through the trammel screening machine included not only brick and concrete block,
but also some lightweight materials. The lightweight materials could be collected by air classification machine to
avoid the air pollution and conform the standards of industrial waste remove, treatment, and store. The coarse material
after air classification machine use the conveyor to pass by the manual separation to collect non-ferrous metals, wood
materials, and plastic and rubber materials. The coarse material could be improved the clean degree after the procedure.
(3) Manual Separation
The magnetic separation machine was set before the manual separation and between trammel screening machine
and air classification machine. The magnetic separation machine could separate the ferrous metals. It could be set
after the wood crush machine to suck the nails and iron effectually when the wood crush procedure. The coarse
material after manual separation could be improved the availability through the crush procedure.

Crushing

ŇŪůŦġ
ōŢųŨŦġŨųŢŷŦŭ
ŢŨŨųŦŨŢŵŦŴ
ŘŰŰťĭůŰůĮŧŦųųŰŶŴġŰųġ
ŰŵũŦųġŮŢŵŦųŪŢŭŴ

Bar Trommel Magnetic Air

C&D waste Manual
screening screening seperation classification seperation

őŢűŦųġŰųġ ŃųŪŤŬĭųŰŤŬġŰųġ
ŇŦųųŰŶŴġŮŦŵŢŭ őŭŢŴŵŪŤŴ ŤŰůŤųŦŵŦ

ňųŢŷŦŭĭŨųŢŪůġ
ŔŢůťġŰųġŔŰŪŭ ŰųġűŦţţŭŦ

Secondary
screening
Fig. 6. Viable technology on Construction waste recycling

3.2 Recycling Status of Construction Waste

The applications of construction waste after treatment were follows[5]:

a) The earthwork was been utilize into landfill.

b) The concrete block and brick could be the resource of landfill or green building materials.
c) Waste wood could be compost or fuel.
d) Metals could be recycled and reused.

The most applications of reuse after classification were been landfill materials that included makeshift road,
materials of roadbed or pipeline. The highest value applications were been recycled aggregate.

3.4 Taiwan’s Eco-Label “Green Material Mark”

730 Ying-Ying Lai et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 35 (2016) 723 – 730

The Architecture and Building Research Institute (ABRI) is a leading national research agency in Taiwan under
the supervision of the Ministry of the Interior. ABRI established the “Green Material Mark” since July, 2004. Through
the promotion of ecological, energy saving, waste reducing, and healthy green buildings and the implementation of
the building energy conservation policy, the ABRI aims to provide a comfortable and healthy indoor environment, to
advance the knowledge-based economic development, to achieve waste reduction and resources efficiency, to assist
the industry upgrading, as well as to create a green environmental-friendly subtropical Taiwan.[6]

There were 1219 marks and 8944 kinds of productsbe approved till 2014. The marks included 934 marks of health,
5 marks of ecology, 104 marks of recycle, and 176 marks of high performance. The products included 6681 kinds of
health, 16 kinds of ecology, 1052 kinds of recycle, and 1195 kinds of high performance.

4. Results and Discussions

In the future, the TEPA will initiate more prospective policies to achieve the goal of Zero Industrial Wastes. The
new policies and management strategies of industrial wastes will take into consideration Taiwan's background of
waste management and the changing industrial structures, environmental risks, and economic benefits. It is expected
to achieve resource recovery, hazardous industrial waste control, and to employ information technology for the control
and inspection of industrial waste. Also, the TEPA expects to reduce industrial waste by 10% and reuse 85% of the
collected waste by 2020. "Sustainable development," "resource recovery and reuse," and "zero waste" are international
trends that Taiwan will follow. The management of industrial waste can benefit and sustain social welfare, economic
growth and environmental protection.

Reference

1) ABRI; Available from: http://www.abri.gov.tw/.EPA. Available from: http://www.epa.gov.tw/ct.asp?

xItem=35570&CtNode=34166&mp=epa.
2) Lo, W.-Y., The remaining construction of earth and logistics control and management system established. 2008.
3) Pan, J.-S., The study on the management of resources products of construction waste treatment facility. 2011.
4) Su, T.-y., The Study of Applying for Establishment of Sand and Crushed Stone Size Reduction Washes Selected Scene to Promote the
Efficiency of Reuse of Construction Excess Soils---Case Study of Taoyuan County. 2009.
5) Yeh, L.-H., Study of estimation of regional building-related C&D waste generation and innovation in C&D
waste management. 2011.