Make Construction Waste Recycling Profitable
In recent years, large-scale engineering construction has driven China’s economic development and significantly improved people’s working and living conditions. At the same time, it has also generated a large amount of construction waste. Much of this waste is piled up or landfilled without treatment, causing not only resource waste but also environmental pollution.
At present, the comprehensive treatment and utilization of construction waste in China remains at a relatively low level. In 2017, China produced about 2.4 billion tons of construction waste, of which only about 120 million tons were recycled, representing a utilization rate of merely 5%. There is still a large gap compared with the construction waste recycling rates in developed countries.
The reasons for this are twofold. On the one hand, enterprises lack sufficient motivation to engage in construction waste recycling. Currently, there is limited policy support such as investment incentives and preferential policies in the construction waste recycling sector, and no effective incentive mechanism has been established. This leaves market participants with little economic incentive to participate, resulting in very few specialized enterprises and institutions, a shortage of professionals in the field, and large volumes of recyclable waste going uncollected and unused, hindering the industrial development of construction waste recycling.
On the other hand, the classification of construction waste is still at a low level. Generally, only high-value materials such as steel reinforcement are recycled, while other low-value construction waste is overlooked, leading to mixed stacking of different materials. This increases the difficulty of waste treatment and recycling. In addition, construction work still relies heavily on on-site operations with a high degree of manual labor and low levels of intelligence and digitization, making it difficult to reduce waste generation and implement on-site classification.
China needs to further improve its construction waste recycling system. In terms of resource utilization, current policies mainly focus on encouragement and guidance, lacking supporting systems such as waste destination monitoring, facility construction, and mandatory use of recycled products, which prevents the formation of a complete industrial chain for construction waste recycling. It is recommended to improve supporting systems, such as establishing a construction waste information platform system. Under the coordination of environmental protection, engineering construction, urban management, and other competent authorities, and with the cooperation of waste producers and treatment units, electronic archives of construction waste should be created, and the entire waste logistics process should be included in the regulatory system.
It is essential to strengthen positive incentives for the production and use of construction waste products to make recycling profitable. Provide production and use enterprises with financial subsidies, preferential loans, and procurement support to offset their cost inputs, narrow the price gap between recycled construction waste products and similar non-recycled products in the market, and ensure their market competitiveness. At the same time, financial departments can set up special project funds to encourage and support the recycling of construction waste, funding activities such as technology introduction and training.
Additionally, increase investment preference: relevant departments should prioritize construction projects that meet green building design standards for approval and investment support. Provide policy and tax incentives to entities willing to use construction waste products as construction materials. For key projects, specify the proportion of construction waste materials required in total engineering materials.
Furthermore, strengthen technical research. Combined with China’s actual conditions, carry out innovative research on construction waste collection, classification, and treatment technologies. Gradually establish a complete system for construction waste recycling in China, standardize the recycling process, and conduct systematic classification, performance evaluation, and quality certification of construction waste products to ensure their market recognition.
