Taipei Port is the only port in Taiwan that accepts Construction Surplus Soil and Basic Oxygen Furnace (BOF) slag, achieving the goal of reusing appropriate resources and materials in the right place and creating a win-win situation for both project and environmental quality.
Northern Taiwan is densely populated, and it is difficult to obtain land for material storage/disposal sites. There are cases of illegal disposal from time to time. The government plans to use the Taipei Port North Pier Logistics Warehousing Area to store Construction Surplus Soil. The long-term project has a time horizon until 2037. On the whole, 73.25 million cubic meters of Construction Surplus Soil will be collected, and 339 hectares of new land will be reclaimed. The project is expected to save approximately US$1.4 billion in construction costs and reduce 275,000 tons of carbon emissions.
BOF slag is often used inproperly and leads to stigmatization. Through corporate cooperation and repeated tests, approximately 5.35 million cubic meters of BOF will be responsibly used in the Taipei Port North Pier Logistics Warehousing Area. A windbreak forest belt was already succesfully planted on a surface filled with BOF slag material. This kind of filling operation saves 38,000 tons of carbon emissions and solidifies 34,000 tons of carbon dioxide through plant covering.
To accommodate Construction Surplus Soil and BOF slag for land reclamation, strict supervision measures needed to be established to ensure environmental quality. Through joint discussions between central units, local governments, private enterprises and port management agencies, a soil exchange platform and the GPS tracking system ensure that safety standards are met from excavation to collection and disposal.
Through this project, Taipei Port has become a demonstration area for Taiwan’s resource reuse and circular economy. Currently, construction and filling of new land are still ongoing, making the Taipei Port an increasingly important base for the development of global operations in northern Taiwan.