The Electronic Waste Manifest System and an RFID-based infectious waste management system are such representative cases, according to president Ko Jae-young, Korea Environment and Resources Corporation in an exclusive interview conducted by the Korea IT Times on the occasion of the Environment Day on June 5th this year. In a nutshell, the electronic information system computerizes the whole process of waste disposal from generation through transportation to final disposal on the website www.wm-s-net.or.kr.
ENVICO has operated the system since 2002 and extended the application to all 35,000 waste dischargers by 2005, according to Ko. "In order to develop the system into a comprehensive waste information system, we are now adding more systems such as the online system that deals with civil applications for waste permission, and a statistical analysis system that analyzes the generation and treatment status of wastes real time," he said.
Regarding operation of this Electronic Waste Manifest System, the environment veteran president said: "As over 85% of designation waste including infectious waste are properly managed through this system, the Corporation came to be able to secure scientific waste statistics material."
When all of ENVICO's nationwide branches use this Electronic Waste Manifest System, he expected that this will contribute to administration expense reduction and administration affairs simplification to the tune of 120 billion won (US$130 million) worth of administration cost reduction and 9.8 million hours reduction.
Ko was proud of the fact that ENVICO is propelling oversea technology transfer of this Electronic Waste Manifest System to Vietnam by saying that the Corporation supports demo program development and system operation, technology special manpower nurturing education, system hardware and software construction as per the Korea-Vietnam memorandum of understanding concluded on December 13, 2006.
Besides, the Corporation is scheduled to enlarge information exchange during the period from May through July this year with Japan Environment Ministry/Industrial Waste Disposal Promotion Center in connection with the Electronic Waste Manifest System, according to Ko.
RFID-based system
What's more, it deserves attention that ENVICO has established an RFID-based infectious waste management system by firstly applying the RFID, an advanced Radio Frequency Identification technology, to waste management.
Through the test operation in 2005, it was now extended to be used in about 50,000 hospitals as of 2006. Ko praised that ENVICO's RFID-based infectious waste management system is being posted as the most successful example among Korea's Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC) RFID pilot projects.
Regarding RFID application effects, the president explained: "First of all, it overcomes real-time input boundary by enabling an exact data confirmation through realtime transmission and reception by excluding wrong input possibility by means of electronic tags."
RFID application improves affairs processes and efficiency among others through automation which has been attained by hand work.
Moreover, it enables management supervision efficiency by allowing the entire hospital's waste disposal flow to grasp exactly through data's real-time abstraction which holds illegal connection possibility.
In connection with ENVICO's RFIDbased infectious waste management system, Ko assessed: "The Corporation has prepared technological and institutional groundwork so that ENVICO can create a new business model to facilitate environment field IT application, thereby allowing to expand/apply to RFID/USN development stage."
In a word, he epitomized that infectious waste's transparent management realization was enabled by means of this RFID-based infectious waste management system, adding that previous check plan for waste management was enabled with infectious waste policy's confidence improvement and waste disposal's transparency.
Synergy effect of grafting IT technology
Touching upon the fact that ENVICO has been contributing to environment preservation and recycling industry development by carrying out businesses for repressing waste generation, recycling and proper disposal, Ko emphasized: "The Corporation has converted anew with policy support function-oriented, which constructs circulation- model resource management system and ushers recycling policy through Extended Producer Responsibility institution operation, Electronic Waste Manifest System, and funding for recycling industry."
Extended Producer Responsibility means that the producer bears a degree of responsibility for the products to the end of their useful life by being imposed a mandatory recycling amount on the products and paying recycling dues on the unfulfilled amounts.
The responsibilities of the producer have mainly been limited to developing environmentally responsible products; but the new EPR system requires the producer to assume a broader range of responsibility for the post-consumer stage, Ko said.
With regard to its funding for the recycling industry, ENVICO has been endeavoring to prevent the waste of resources since 1994 through actively promoting waste recycling programs that lead to the establishment of a sustainable resource recycling society, by providing low interest loans to domestic recycling businesses. From the year 2007, ENVICO's affairs become even more specialized and subdivided, according to Ko. Thus, the Corporation is carrying out businesses to utilize confiscated goods as resources by teaming up with a police office in Seoul area and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism for example.
Urgent environment power construction
In relation to his management philosophy, Ko stressed: "Corporations under the influence of the government must make efforts from now on for their management rationalization and profit creation rather than remaining at a merely public undertaking any more."
According to such strategy, ENVICO is pursuing projects to create new profit structure aggressively including waste disposal facility installation inspection diagnosis affairs, collection business for disposing useless transformers safely and the Corporation's 2010 vision in the long run, according to Ko.
In the light of the fact that the 21st century is the era of environment, the environment- veteran concluded: "Korea too must become an environment power globally to afford environment brand to be able to present to the world."
