Officials to cover Phuket garbage dump to stop further fires

[webfact]

Officials to cover Phuket garbage dump to stop further fires
Nattha Thepbamrung


An excavator shifts garbage to allow water to be poured into the pile to prevent further fires.

PHUKET: -- Following the fire at one of the landfills next to the provincial incinerator in Phuket Town on Tuesday (March 17), officials are hastening to take steps to prevent a recurrence.

Governor Nisit Jansomwong visited the site yesterday (March 18) and said that the fire, which burned some two rai of the 22-rai dump, was possibly caused by a combination of hot weather and flammable garbage.

“The garbage pile contains mattresses and other flammable materials which is why it took a long time – four or five hours – to put the fire out,” the Governor said.

“The solution for now is to cover up the whole area and compact it to prevent oxygen from getting inside the garbage. This will cost B89 million. We expect the work to be completed in around a month.

“Until then, Phuket Municipality and the Department of Phuket Disaster Prevention and Mitigation will send water trucks to the site every day to damp down the garbage to prevent [another] fire."

The dump is currently overfilled. The fire broke out in dump No 5, which is supposed to hold only two layers of garbage but now has three.

“There is excess garbage because one of the incinerators is still broken. However, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment has approved a budget of B530 million for repairing it. As soon as the budget arrives repairs will start,” the Governor explained.

Asked whether there had been any health effects from the smoke from the fire, he said that he had received no complaints. He added that the wind at the time had blown most of the smoke out to sea.

Source: http://www.thephuketnews.com/officials-to-cover-phuket-garbage-dump-to-stop-further-fires-51483.php


-- Phuket News 2015-03-19

[hansgruber]

530 million baht to repair? Is it made of gold or something?

[ColdSingha]

give it a couple of years and they can build villas all over it (cough like samui cough)

[maidee]

me thinks, they put the fire, to make some room

as nobody will fine them anyway

this being thailand after all ....

land of smoke (los)

[FredNL]

Governor Nisit Jansomwong visited the site yesterday (March 18) and said that the fire, which burned some two rai of the 22-rai dump, was possibly caused by a combination of hot weather and flammable garbage.

“The garbage pile contains mattresses and other flammable materials which is why it took a long time – four or five hours – to put the fire out,” the Governor said."

“The solution for now is to cover up the whole area and compact it to prevent oxygen from getting inside the garbage. This will cost B89 million. We expect the work to be completed in around a month."

IDIOTS !!! This is not a solution !!! It will only create methane gas. The methane gas was probably (99,99999% chance) also the cause of the fire. One spark is enough.

As an engineer I developed natural gas plants on garbage dumps in the late 1980's. For several millions per year they can get my expertise.

The gas can be extracted from the dump and sold to a 3rd party.

Edited March 19, 2015 by FredNL

[Oziex1]

Scape it up drop it at the beach, nobody will notice the difference.

[jcisco]

530 million baht to repair? Is it made of gold or something?

Well singapore paid in 1992 I think 600 Million for their 3rd rubbish incinerator. I'd imagine if it needs a serious retrofit and maintenance, it could run to 20 million. Does seem excessive, but i am just guessing as to what is reasonable anyways.

Edit and I might add that price was for a 56MW of generation capacity on two turbines for generating electricity from the trash.

And in current fit-ment can do 2400t of waste per day......

Edited March 21, 2015 by jcisco

[fiddlehead]

give it a couple of years and they can build villas all over it (cough like samui cough)

That's exactly what they do in the coal regions of Pennsylvania, USA.

I've dumped there, I've watched them cover it up, I've visited friends who have bought houses there 10 years later.

Somehow it's all legal.

Wouldn't surprise me at all if they did it here, although I don't think it will happen right next to the incinerators.

I do see something similar going on over by Palai seafood. (turn left before Palai and go back there and you can see they are creating land to possibly sell, by filling in the tin mine lakes with garbage and then covering it with earth.

Buyer beware!