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Greener
Transport
"
Our Own Operations
We
will avoid, reduce and control environmental pollution arising
from our day-to-day working practices
"
Chart
of EPD vehicles use environmentally-friendly fuel
Office
Transport
Our Local
Control Offices have been maximising the use of our departmental
vehicles by combining trips. In 1999, we also joined in the
pooling system of government vehicles at Revenue Tower in
Wanchai North to maximise the use of vehicles between departments.
These measures have helped us to increase our operations without
purchasing additional vehicles since 1996.
We have
initiated and implemented a non-idling policy for our vehicles
in an effort to reduce air pollution.
All but
one of our vehicles - mainly medium vans, saloons, and motorcycles
- run on petrol, instead of the more polluting diesel fuel.
The only non-petrol vehicle is one saloon which runs on LPG,
and it is utilised more than other vehicles in the department.
Our new mobile Environmental Resource Centre will also run
on LPG.
In 1999,
we initiated discussion with the Government Land Transport
Agency (GLTA) to include environmental performance considerations
in awarding contracts for hired vehicles, e.g. black smoke
emission, the use of petrol instead of diesel, and the installation
of particulate traps and/or catalyst converters.
We intend
to improve our own performance further and will be devising
internal green transport plans for our operations to promote
greater use of efficient and environmentally friendly means
of transport by 2001.
Image
of The new mobile Environmental Resource Centre runs on LPG
image of The LPG tank of the mobile Environmental Resource
Centre
Image of Demonstration of the use of LPG in one of our vehicles
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Minimising
Waste Transport
To reduce the environmental impact of waste transport
to the landfills, seven Refuse Transfer Stations (RTS)
have been commissioned to provide an efficient and environmentally
acceptable mode of transporting waste. Waste delivered
by small refuse collection vehicles (RCV) is transferred
at the RTS into bulk waste containers, which are then
taken to landfills either by land or by sea.
Each
of the waste containers can accommodate the equivalent
of three to five RCV-loads. The bulk waste transfer,
in particular the marine transfer stations, has significantly
reduced the traffic, noise and air emission problems
that may otherwise be caused by direct hauling of waste
to landfills. In 1999, some 900 trips daily were eliminated.
An eighth RTS in the North West New Territories will
be commissioned in late 2001.
Image
of Refuse transfer stations reduce pollution from the
use of a large number of small refuse collection vehicles
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