Dioxin: Proximity to Tokyo dooms Tokorozawa

[Neil Tangri <ntangri@essential.org>]

May 4, 1999

Dioxin: Proximity to Tokyo dooms Tokorozawa

Second in a series By MICK CORLISS Staff writer

TOKOROZAWA, Saitama Pref. -- Eiko Kotani's backyard is known the nation
over for its garbage. A resident of Tokorozawa's Kunugiyama district for
nearly two decades, she has spent the last nine years watching the forest
behind her home become a haven for waste incinerators.

Today, the area goes by the colorful moniker "industrial waste Ginza."

It was in November 1991 when rancid smoke first assaulted Kotani and sent
her into the forest behind her house to find its source. She was shocked to
find a smoldering pile of garbage in an open space concealed by trees a few
hundred meters from her home. This was one of the first incinerators in
Kunugiyama.

The area, a scraggly belt of forest at the junction of four municipalities
-- Miyoshi, Sayama, Kawagoe and Tokorozawa -- is simply called Kunugiyama
by locals and has gained dubious distinction as one of, if not the most,
concentrated waste incinerator sites in Japan.

Despite its appearance, Kunugiyama is not a natural forest. This once naked
plain was planted by locals at the request of the resident feudal lord over
300 years ago to prevent topsoil erosion. Historically, this wall of trees
has supplied a wind block as well as a local source of fuel and fertilizer.
The forest helped create and sustain a fertile environment that in turn
helps sustain one of the nation's top tea-producing areas.

"Before 1991, there were only one or two waste incinerators in the area,"
said Susumu Yokoyama, a farmer who produces mostly organic produce and uses
leaves from the forest as fertilizer.

But that changed at the beginning of this decade. Incinerators began to pop
up in and around the woods in the area, then soon became pervasive, he said.

Until recently, nearly 60 of the prefecture's 277 incinerators operated in
the area of the four municipalities. The smokestacks of roughly 16 of these
pierce the forest canopy within a 500-meter radius of Kunugiyama.

As the number of incinerators billowing black clouds increased, so did the
residents' unease. This was heightened when results from an independent
study released in December 1995 found high dioxin levels in the soil and
ash in Kunugiyama and the surrounding area, including Koku Koen -- a
popular park in central Tokorozawa.

Concern deepened when half of the 30 air samples taken by the
municipalities in the area found dioxin concentrations exceeding the
national standard of 0.8 picograms per cubic meter. A picogram is
one-trillionth of a gram. Six of the sites where the samples were taken
were schools.

Further investigation and calculation by citizens using government
statistics have found infant mortality rates higher than the prefectural
average in municipalities with higher concentrations of incinerators.

But why this concentration of incinerators around Tokorozawa?

Both citizens and government officials agree that more than one factor is
involved.

The largest factor at play is probably the area's proximity to Tokyo.

Less than the ideal neighbor, the metropolis exports its waste to
surrounding areas to be processed before it is shuttled to the oceans or
the mountains for final disposal. Citizens estimate that more than 80
percent of the garbage sent to Saitama Prefecture for processing originates
in Tokyo.

And just one exit from Tokyo on the Kanetsu Expressway, the Tokorozawa
interchange sits on an ideal location for waste disposal companies.
Kunugiyama has the misfortune to lie a mere 15 minutes by car from this
highway exit.

"We think the reason incinerators sprang up around Kunugiyama from around
1992 is because that is the period when Chiba Prefecture began to cut the
amount of industrial waste it allows in from other prefectures by
introducing a prior consultation system," said Toshihiko Maeda, the leader
of a local citizens' group.

It also makes economic sense for waste disposal companies, because Saitama
Prefecture is on the way to final disposal sites, according to Maeda.

"Tokorozawa and Kunugiyama are only 20 or 30 km from Tokyo, and from here
companies can easily take the garbage to Nagano, Gunma, Fukushima and
Aomori prefectures or the Hokuriku region. It is very convenient
geographically for (waste disposal) companies, and it allows them to make
more money since most of them get paid per trip."

In addition to its "prime" location, the Kunugiyama area straddles four
municipalities and does not fall under the jurisdiction of any one
administrative entity. This makes it difficult for citizens to air their
complaints and concerns toward any one municipality or individual.

To field the citizens' criticism and concerns, like those of Maeda, the
prefectural government set up a unit to handle dioxin policy in April 1998.

"Until 1997, the dioxin issue was addressed mainly from the position of
waste and garbage incineration," said Ikuo Sakurai, a member of the
prefecture's dioxin policy team.

"From 1997, the problem really became more evident, and we realized that we
needed to conduct surveys of the soil, air and (dioxin) levels in blood and
human ingestion." 

In addition, Saitama Prefecture, one of the prefectures without a prior
consultation system to limit the shipping of garbage from other areas,
plans to introduce one this fall, he added.

After a February news report warning of high levels of dioxin contamination
in local produce that temporarily made spinach produced by farmers such as
Yokoyama almost worthless, the prefecture urged incinerator operators to
voluntarily shut down on Sundays and holidays.

But this has not visibly reduced the amount of waste being burned, which
reached almost 500 tons per day in 1998, according to prefectural
statistics obtained by locals.

While the air may clear on Sundays, this has only forced incinerators to
change their hours of operation, citizens say, citing an increase in the
number of facilities that run at night. 
The recent setting and gradual tightening of incinerator dioxin emissions
limits are part of government efforts to reduce the amount of dioxin
released nationwide by almost 90 percent of 1997 levels by 2002.

In December 1997, the Health and Welfare Ministry revised the Waste
Disposal Law, reducing dioxin emission limits for the first time ever.
These revisions took effect on Dec. 1, 1998.

Under the revised law, incinerators in operation Dec. 1 are allowed to
release up to 80 nanograms of dioxin per cubic meter of emissions until
December 2002, at which point, depending on their size, they must meet
standards of 10 nanograms or less. A nanogram is a billionth of a gram.

Newer facilities are faced with even stricter standards, of between 0.1 and
5 nanograms, depending on their capacity.

But critics contend that this law is merely an indirect endorsement of the
status quo, and that the interim effluent value of 80 nanograms is much too
high -- 800 times that allowed by Germany or the Netherlands.

"There is not a single facility in Kunugiyama that has been stopped because
it is releasing more than 80 nanograms. They have all cleared this level,"
Maeda said.

"This (80-nanogram) standard is not at all useful in reducing the number of
incinerators here."

Of the 59 incinerators currently operating in the Tokorozawa vicinity, 24
have either been scrapped or are retooling to meet new government
regulations, according to the prefecture. The remaining 35 all clear the
interim standard, Sakurai said.

But even if they all meet the standard, it is the sheer number of
facilities that is the problem, say locals, who called on the Health
Ministry late last month to adopt policies limiting dioxin emissions in any
one area.

However, Kotani maintains that the plants that have closed or are retooling
are small and that garbage is simply being transferred to other sites for
incineration.

And a former worker at a local waste processing plant agrees.

"If we don't take the garbage, what will happen? It will rot on the streets
and people will get angry. Someone has to burn it," said Fardine Ohara, who
worked at a Kunugiyama incinerator up until mid-April.

When it comes to dioxin, few things are certain in Kunugiyama and
Tokorozawa. Interest is high and change is on the menu, but not fast enough
to satisfy local residents. For now, the garbage trucks continue to roll in
from Tokyo with their unpopular cargo. 



--

Neil Tangri