广州花都：从“皮具之都”到“绿色燃料库”Guangzhou Huadu: From 'Leather Capital' to 'Green Fuel Depot'

Huadu District of Guangzhou adheres to comprehensive urban planning, incorporating the management of solid wastes such as leather scraps and bonsai pruning branches into the overall framework for pollution reduction and carbon reduction across the district. It establishes a full chain from source classification, standardized collection and transportation, to resource-based disposal, and extends governance services down to industrial parks, enterprise workshops, bonsai bases, and the frontlines of farmers.

Huadu District is nationally known as the 'Chinese Leather Capital,' and generates large amounts of general industrial solid waste such as leather scraps and old fabrics, facing issues such as high disposal costs for enterprises, random dumping, and environmental risk hazards. At the same time, Huadu District is the core area for the Lingnan-style bonsai industry, producing scattered bonsai pruning branches and green tree trimmings. Previously, these were mostly handled by farmers themselves, and open-air burning was common and difficult to curb, causing air pollution from particulate matter, VOCs, and carbon monoxide, as well as wasting biomass resources.

In Shiling Town, Huadu District has strengthened the source-level management of industrial solid waste, establishing more than 20 waste leather collection points covering major industrial parks, specialized markets, and enterprise clusters. This guides leather goods manufacturers to implement classified collection and ledger management of solid waste, reinforcing the responsibility of waste generation entities. For the bonsai industry, the district widely mobilizes bonsai gardens, potted plant growers, and landscaping maintenance units to actively participate in resource utilization, encourages proper disposal of pruned dead branches, and eliminates the traditional practice of on-site burning, thereby reducing diffuse air pollution from the source.

Faced with the practical constraints of limited rural construction land and the difficulty of establishing standardized fixed collection stations, Huadu District has innovatively launched a new collection and disposal model of “overlapping waste leather collection points with bonsai dead branch collection, standardized on-ground storage, and scheduled centralized removal.” This model relies on over 20 waste leather collection points in Shiling Town for unified collection and scheduling, while organizing party members and cadres to provide door-to-door services, aiming to resolve the 'last mile' issues in disposing of bonsai dead branches and industrial offcuts.

Under the compliance guidance and technical support of the ecological and environmental departments, resource-utilization enterprises in the jurisdiction have formed the capacity to produce 180,000 tons of environmentally friendly RDF fuel rods annually. They use a glue-free, adhesive-free cold pressing molding process, significantly reducing volatile organic compound emissions. The product is made by mixing 75% leather scraps from the Shiling luggage industry with 25% bonsai dead branches, crop straw, and waste textiles, reaching a calorific value of up to 18,000 kJ/kg.

Data shows that 1 ton of RDF fuel rods can replace 0.6 tons of standard coal, with an ash content of only 18%, much lower than coal’s 80% ash content. The sulfur content is low, and the potential reduction of sulfur dioxide per ton of fuel reaches 13 kg SO₂, fully meeting the standards for co-firing in thermal power plants. For every ton of coal replaced in power generation, CO₂ emissions on the fuel side can be reduced by 0.7 tons; if all related capacity is used for co-firing, annual CO₂ reduction exceeds 140,000 tons. For every ton of fuel rods produced, more than 0.2 tons of bonsai dead branches and other agricultural and forestry waste can be utilized, reducing carbon monoxide emissions by over 100 tons annually.

From an economic perspective, under the supply of RDF fuel rods to downstream thermal power enterprises, each ton can save about 300 yuan in costs, meeting the requirements of the national 'Action Plan for Low-Carbon Reconstruction of Coal-fired Power (2024–2027),' and realizing 10% stable biomass co-firing in power plants, helping the region's coal power energy structure transition to low-carbon. Huadu District stated that the next step will be to continue deepening the collaboration between government and enterprises, using pilot projects to drive broader implementation, and continuously expand the contribution of solid waste resource utilization to the district's pollution reduction and carbon reduction efforts.

[Source: Guangzhou Ecology and Environment]

[Editor: Xiao Neng]