SLC Strives to Enter New and Renewable Energy Center

Landfill keeping with the government? low-carbon, green growth and waste-recycling management policies

Declaring "low-carbon, green growth" as the nation's new growth paradigm, the Lee Myung-bak government stresses the recycling of wastes into resources while devoting efforts to secure new and renewable energy sources. In keeping with the paradigm shift, SLC President Cho Chun-koo says, "Wastes are no longer waste, but energy, and SLC is striving to transform the world's largest landfill into a center of low-carbon, green growth. The following are excerpts of an interview between NewsWorld and SLC President and CEO Cho Chun-koo, who spoke about a mission and a vision of making the world's largest landfill a center of low-carbon, green growth.
Question: Congratulations on SLC being rated in the "Good" category of the 2008 public entity management assessment survey. What does this mean for the SLC?
Answer: Thanks. The better assessment of the SLC is owed not just to me, but also to its executives and staff members who put their heart and soul into realizing a mission and a vision of making the world's largest landfill site a center of low-carbon, green growth, a "Dreampark" in pursuit of people's well-being and a world's top-rated environmental attraction.
The SLC, not resting on its laurels with this outcome, is striving to evolve into an example of waste treatment for spearheading the low-carbon, green growth paradigm by developing the landfill site into a 'Metropolitan Eco & Energy Town' to realize the recycling of wastes into resources, role model of the new paradigm.


























Q: Will you describe the SLC's responsibilities?
A: The SLC is an affiliated organization of the Ministry of Environment at Baekseok-dong, Seo-gu, Incheon, Korea, The SLC manages a 20 million sq. meter ,the world's largest, landfill site that treats a daily average of 18,000 tons of waste that the roughly 22 million residents of the Seoul metropolitan area discharge. The SLC envisages the world's largest environmental and ecological attraction through the implementation of 'Metropolitan Eco & Energy Town' and 'Dreampark' projects.
Q: The SLC marks its ninth anniversary this year, and one year has passed since you took office. How do you feel?
A: On July 22 we celebrate our ninth anniversary. I recalled that neighborhood residents dubbed the change of the landfill site "convulsions of nature" when I took office last year. The SLC? executives and staff have devoted their efforts to make many things change during the nine-year period. The landfill site, once considered a disgust-causing facility, has been operating in an efficient and sanitary manner, and such efforts to change it into an environmentally-friendly one, with efforts such as the environment-themed "Dreampark" have been made. Capitalizing on the expertise and achievements it has accumulated in the course of the stable operation of the world's largest landfill, departing from an initial stage of operation, the SLC is taking a step forward ― transforming wastes into new and renewable energy sources in accordance with low-carbon, green growth and waste-recycling management policies. In an effort to renew its determination, the SLC has changed its catchphrase from "SUDOKWON Landfill to DREAMPARK" to "Waste, but Energy!"












Q: The Eco & Energy Town project is reportedly expected to have difficulties. How will you carry it out?
A: We're in the process of the implementation of the project with diverse parties, including neighborhood residents, the government, the three local governments, environmental bodies and waste treatment companies who have conflicts of interest.
Neighborhood residents, favoring the park project, which includes golf courses, demand that the landfill be stopped by 2016. Seoul and two other local governments want the landfill to be permanent, given the reality that alternatives to the landfill site, handling the wastes from the Seoul metropolitan area, cannot be found.
The central government demands the recycling of wastes into energy sources in order to respond to crude oil prices hikes in a nation dependent on foreign countries for energy imports.
The authorization of the landfill site expires in about 35 years. It is out of the question to secure a new large-scale waste dump site down the road in the Seoul metropolitan area. As a countermeasure, the waste-to-energy project ― the 'Metropolitan Eco & Energy Town'― which would reduce by 78 percent the amount disposed of in the landfill compared to the conventional method, will allow its life to be prolonged 100 years more.
The construction of a "Dreampark" sports grounds for the 2014 Asian Games under a world-class environment-tourist attraction project may be accepted by the residents who have to put up with the landfill site's environmental impact.
We're going to have a master plan in the long-term perspective. We're commissioned to treat wastes properly and change them into energy by the state, but we have no other rights for which to use the landfill site, so we're facing difficulties in pushing 'Metropolitan Eco & Energy Town' and 'Dreampark' projects. The SLC's trying its best to keep the projects moving forward without a hitch and without wavering from the pressure of interest groups' maneuvering.
Q: Many neighborhood residents favor the planned construction of the "Dreampark" sports grounds for the 2014 Asian Games, part of the project to develop the landfill site into an eco-tourism center. Will you give details of the plan?
A: The eco-tourism center is designed to make the most of Incheon International Airport's standing as a logistics hub of Northeast Asia and connect the 2014 Incheon Asian Games and such projects as the Gyungin Ara Waterway and other neighborhood development projects as well as the development of environmental resources in the Seoul metropolitan area.
The planned project calls for the construction of four theme parks ― a green bio complex, a leisure-sports complex, an environment/energy culture complex and natural ecologic complex ― following environment, culture and leisure-sports, the themes of the SLC. A world-class environmentally-friendly leisure-sports complex, containing some sports grounds for the 2014 Incheon Asian Games and sports facilities for residents, and a green bio complex with genetic applications for fauna and flora, catering to families, will be initially implemented by 2012 with the goal of creating about 1,000 new jobs.
Q: There will be lots of transformation in SLC landfill site. Please give the last comment?
A: Residents and metropolitan citizens can visit and take a rest at Dreampark where the waste turns into energy in the near future. The SLC consistently pursues business innovation and up-to-date technology development, which enable sustainable low-carbon, green growth. I hope that continuous good cooperation with the neighborhood residents and related organizations for the green future. nw

SLC President Cho Chun-koo

The SLC has changed its catchphrase from "SUDOKWON Landfill to DREAMPARK" to "Waste, but Energy!"

(from left)The SLC's first landfill site changing into a lawn after concluding its role as a landfill; a neighborhood residents enjoy an athletic meeting; and the 2008 Dreampark Chrysanthemum Festival gets under way at the SLC