The Yomiuri Shimbun | Oct. 30, 2010
Once seen as a potential solution to the question of how to recycle garbage, refuse-derived fuel (RDF) has become a public financial burden, as the resulting fuel is substandard for industrial use....
More than half of the nation's 50 local government-run facilities used for turning burnable garbage and discarded plastics into fuel have paid steel and paper companies to use the RDF they produce.
Production costs also run high: It costs more than twice as much to turn garbage into fuel than it does to merely incinerate it. Many local governments have discovered the more RDF they make, the more it costs. In light of this, operations at some of the facilities have been suspended.
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