Industrialization Still Goes a Long Way with 60 Billion China’s Construction Waste Disposal Market
 
China annual output of construction waste accounts for 30% to 40% of total urban waste with the increasing development of building industry, especially for real estate. Furthermore, domestic construction waste production had increased from 297 million tons in 2001 to 1,546 million tons in 2012, a rise of 4 times, which includes old building demolition, building operations and architectural decoration. The details are as followed.   
 
In the first place, there is about one ton per square meter construction waste produced by old building demolition according to the Analysis Report on Prospect and Investment Strategies of China Construction Waste Disposal Industry from 2015 to 2020. As a consequence, it was estimated by Forward Industry Research Institute that there was about 846 million tons old building demolition waste in 2012.    

In the second place, 1%-4% construction waste will be produced as per cubic meter building constructed in terms of construction and installation. As a result, it is calculated that this kind of construction waste would reach 589 million tons in 2012, increasing 4 times that of in 2001. At last, construction waste produced by architectural decoration also rose 4 times according to relevant calculating standard.         
 
 
There are two processing methods for construction waste. On the one hand, those waste will be carried to disposal site for reclamation, landfill or incineration. On the other hand, construction waste resource enterprises purchase building debris from engineering contractors and then send to recycle and reproduce. At present, the former way has been promoted although the recycling rate is low, which is less than 5%. Nevertheless, China’s annual construction waste emissions account for more than 30% of total urban waste. In a word, there is a large demand in construction waste disposal industry.          
However, it is hard to recycle the construction waste efficiently in China now, especially for the private companies which is difficult to run. The various aspects of reasons are as follows.

   
High Costs of Construction Waste Acquisition
Chinese private enterprises spend higher amount of money obtaining construction waste due to the strict supervision. Some relevant industrial reports showed that the fees of per ton of building waste that enterprise gets, transportation and disposal cost 20RMB. What’s worse, the cost of waste disposal reaches about 30RMB in some reselling districts, which increase burden of waste recycling enterprises without doubt. In this case, as municipal department is unable to dispose all of waste, it is necessary to bring PPP mode in building waste treatment field.  

Low costs of Direct Emission
Parts of engineering contractors who own the resources of building waste are more inclined to release the waste directly because of the low price of discharge standard. Therefore, those contractors don’t show enthusiasm in recycling the construction waste.  

The Proportion of Construction Waste Building Materials Should be Increased
As coarse and fine aggregates are sorted by waste concrete and masonry, not only can various strength levels concrete and mortar be produced, but also all kinds of building materials products, including blocks, wall panels, floor tiles and so on, which has plenty of advantages, such as reduction and recycle of building waste, natural energy saving and ecological environment protection with high economic value. According to the Analysis of the Kunming Biji Tourism Ring Road, among which the experimental section built by construction waste could save about 30% of the cost compared with stone mined and carried from other places.    
 
Big Investment in Disposal Equipment
Enterprises must spend a large amount of money purchasing building waste disposal equipment. For example, a professional disposal machine costs 1.6 million while the equipment produced by local enterprises costs vary from tens of thousands to two million RMB with different automated mechanical performance and uneven quality. However, ordinary companies and persons can’t afford such expensive equipment. Therefore, the major buyers now contain some competitive property developers, environment investment companies, etc, especially for municipal department in large and medium-sized cities.
Fortunately, the government will provide corresponding supportive policies and financial subsidies in order to help those enterprises developing better which are engaged in building waste recycling because of their public nature. At the same time, a cluster of model industrial parks are also built to improve the industrial system, which will promote the development of China’s circular economy.       
The fourth China International Aggregates, Quarrying Tailings & Construction Waste Disposal Exhibition (Aggregates China 2018) will be held in Guangzhou before long.