What Manila can learn from Shanghai

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Power in trash

While Manila struggles to manage its mounting waste problem, Shanghai faces an unlikely challenge: a “shortage” of trash.

A tale of two cities

Metro Manila generates approximately 10,000 tons of garbage daily, much of which ends up in overburdened landfills in Rizal province, or worse, pollutes Manila Bay or clogs the city’s barely functioning drainage system, esteros and waterways.

Garbage collection in Metro Manila is always a challenge, segregation is inconsistent and often taken for granted by most residents, and local governments face rising costs, or worse, debts to keep trash out of homes and off the streets.

Meanwhile, in Shanghai, the story has taken a dramatic turn. Like other megacities, the Chinese financial and economic hub once struggled with high waste volumes. Over the past decade, the city has built a system that not only keeps its garbage off its streets and waterways but converts much of it into energy. The city has invested in waste-to-energy (WTE) infrastructure and now operates 15 municipal solid waste incineration plants alongside 13 food waste resource recovery facilities, with a combined capacity to process 39,000 tons of garbage daily.

The result: cleaner streets, zero reliance on landfills, and sometimes not enough garbage to feed Shanghai’s incineration plants.

According to industry executives, Shanghai’s unexpected “shortage” of trash can be attributed largely to the city’s strict, mandatory waste-sorting policies introduced in 2019.

Residents of the city, one of the world’s biggest with 25 million people, must strictly separate food scraps from recyclables, wet from dry or paper from plastic. Recyclables like paper, metal and plastic are sent to materials recovery facilities for sorting before being converted into new materials like construction bricks or alloys for electric cars. Trash not designated for “dry waste” — the primary feedstock for WTE facilities — like kitchen or “wet waste” is bio-treated for fermentation, turning them into organic fertilizer or biogas for electricity or natural gas.

Urban oasis

One of the vital players in the city’s waste management system is the Baoshan Renewable Energy Utilization Center, a modern WTE facility built along the Yangtze River estuary in Shanghai’s Baoshan District. The facility, backed by SUS Environment’s technology and engineering expertise, was recently visited by our group of executives and editors from The STAR for a plant tour.

Designed to look more like an urban oasis than a WTE center, the facility features a roof park with lush plants, walking paths and public recreational spaces, reflecting Shanghai’s goal of fostering a greener, healthier living environment for the city’s residents.

According to SUS Environment investment manager Giorgino Naval, the Baoshan WTE facility is equipped with world-class processing technologies and facilities that meet stringent global environmental standards.

An industry first in China, the facility solves the problem of secondary pollution caused by the separate disposal of wet waste by integrating the design and operation of dry and wet waste treatment facilities.

Daily, the facility can process 3,000 tons of municipal dry waste through incineration and 800 tons of wet or kitchen waste through anaerobic digestion for biogas production. It is also capable of generating 800 million kWh of power annually — enough to supply the power needs of Shanghai’s permanent residents for a month.

While replicating this type of facility may not be feasible in the Philippines in the near term, Naval said policymakers now fully recognize the importance of turning to modern WTE technologies, beginning in Metro Manila, to address the worsening garbage problem while generating an additional source of energy.

“We are very grateful for the Department of Energy’s support and push for pioneering waste-to-energy projects in the Philippines. They genuinely sought feedback from all stakeholders and we appreciate that,’’ he said.

While the DOE has taken the lead in advancing WTE projects, stakeholders stress that long-term success will require a whole-of-government approach.

“Beyond the DOE, stronger coordination with lawmakers, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the Department of Interior and Local Government and local government units is seen as critical,’’ Naval said.

Lessons from Shanghai

As Metro Manila searches for long-term solutions to its mounting waste crisis, Shanghai’s experience with WTE offers a practical roadmap — one grounded as much in governance and public trust as in technology.

Naval pointed out that success begins with choosing the right technology. He said that facilities like Shanghai’s Baoshan plant, which adopts the grate and related technical services provided by China SUS, use systems suited for high-moisture, low-calorific waste — conditions similar to those in Metro Manila — while maintaining strict emissions standards through advanced flue gas treatment.

But technology alone is not enough. According to Naval, Shanghai’s rapid rollout was driven by clear policies and decisive governance, allowing projects to move from approval to construction without delay.

“The success of Shanghai is inseparable from the clear regulations supported by the government. After making the decision to launch the WTE solution, the construction of the Baoshan project was launched that year, and the worries about the project’s implementation were quickly cleared by the upstream and downstream supporting facilities,” he said.

“Equally critical was transparency. Authorities opened facilities to the public, shared real-time emission data and actively engaged communities to address ‘not-in-my-backyard’ issues. These efforts help eliminate public doubts and at the same time obtain social recognition for the projects,’’ he explained.

Naval said the city also adopted a holistic approach, integrating waste collection, processing and energy generation into a single, efficient system. “This end-to-end model not only improved disposal efficiency but also maximized power output while easing urban environmental pressure,” he said.

Finally, Naval said a stable business framework underpinned the system. “With government absorbing policy risks and private firms handling operations and technology, Shanghai created a sustainable, long-term model — one that ensured both profitability and reliable service delivery,’’ he said.

Taken together, these lessons suggest that for Metro Manila, the path to effective WTE is not just about building plants, but about building a system that work — from policy and public trust to operations and investments.

Beyond landfills

Under the Philippine Energy Plan (PEP), the government aims to raise the share of renewables in the energy mix to 35 percent by 2030 and 50 percent by 2040. To ensure a more diversified and resilient energy mix, the PEP has also integrated WTE projects into the Green Energy Auction (GEA) framework.

Early this year, the DOE began rolling out the GEA-6, a specialized round for WTE projects, with the Energy Regulatory Commission proposing a preliminary reserve price of P8.016/kWh as rules and design projects are being finalized.

This action marks the country’s first serious attempt to scale WTE through a competitive auction system. The auction is expected to offer 170 megawatts of WTE capacity, with 120 MW allocated for Luzon, including Metro Manila.

While the policy framework has already been laid, energy officials said implementation remains the real test for WTE development in the country as it continues to face challenges such as regulatory and institutional alignment, feedstock availability and quality, financial viability, and public perception and environmental concerns.

According to Naval, passing the proposed WTE bill would provide a clear policy framework, while stricter enforcement against open dumpsites and substandard landfills could level the playing field and improve project viability.

“The WTE bill needs to be passed. We understand this bill is already a part of the President’s LEDAC priority bills so hopefully it passes into law before the special round of Green Energy Auction for WTE begins,” he said.

“At the local level, better coordination among governors, mayors and the MMDA (for Metro Manila’s unique case) is also needed to consolidate waste volumes, identify suitable sites and achieve economies of scale — key factors in making WTE projects both sustainable and cost-efficient,’’ he added.

Regarding concerns over waste segregation, Naval said this can be mitigated by a WTE system based on mechanical grate furnace technology. “This is well-suited to the country’s waste profile as it can process unsorted municipal waste with minimal to no loss in energy generation,” he said.

“This technology is already widely tested and implemented successfully in China, which has similar waste profile, if not worse (because of higher moisture content due to the prevalence of soups in their food), compared to the Philippines,” he added.

“SUS WTE operations do not require waste segregation. Our WTE design and systems will work and generate energy at high efficiency, regardless if the waste delivered to the facility is segregated or not,” the SUS executive said.

Viability

Despite concerns about the financial viability of WTE in the country due to significant upfront capital requirements, the DOE said that several local companies, particularly those engaged in energy infrastructure, engineering, procurement and construction, and waste management, have expressed interest in WTE development.

“The department continues to receive proposals and expressions of interest from both local and international proponents, indicating sustained interest in the sector,’’ it said. However, the DOE did not name the companies that expressed interest in participating in WTE projects.

The DOE also said that to encourage private sector participation in WTE, it is implementing measures to promote private sector participation through policy support, investment facilitation and improved regulatory processes.

“These efforts include streamlining procedures, issuing clear development guidelines, and coordinating with relevant agencies to address bottlenecks. The DOE also encourages public-private partnerships and joint ventures with LGUs,’’ it said.

For Manila, the challenge now lies in aligning national policy, local government implementation, private-sector investment and public cooperation in proper waste disposal — factors that ultimately determine whether WTE can take root as a sustainable solution to the city’s growing garbage problem.

Shanghai’s journey — a product of strong government support, heavy investment in technology and a sustainable business model — shows what is possible. The question is whether Manila can chart its own course — before its mounting waste becomes an even heavier burden.