Landfills go quiet as Seoul’s trash heads to incinerators — and other regions

A truck is seen at Sudokwon Landfill in Incheon, Jan. 2. Just 66 tons of household waste entered the facility on the second day of the capital‑area direct landfill ban, about 3 percent of the previous daily average of 2,045 tons of household waste. Yonhap

Seoul’s waste management system changed overnight on Jan. 1.

Trucks that once lined up to dump mixed household waste at the Sudokwon Landfill Site in Incheon, west of the capital, have largely disappeared. Only ash and residue from incineration can now be buried there, forcing Seoul and other local governments in the capital region to burn or recycle their trash before anything is landfilled.

According to the government-run Sudokwon Landfill Management Corp., just 66 tons of household waste entered the Incheon facility on the second day of the capital area's direct landfill ban. That is only about 3 percent of the 2,045‑ton daily average for directly landfilled household waste recorded there last year.

Under the new policy, local governments in Seoul, Incheon and Gyeonggi Province are no longer allowed to bury household garbage in standard pay‑as‑you‑throw bags at the Sudokwan facility. Only waste that has been processed first, such as incineration ash or nonrecyclable residues left after sorting, can now be buried there.

The rule is the first stage of a nationwide shift, with the same ban scheduled to apply to the rest of Korea in 2030, part of a broader push to move away from landfill‑centered disposal toward a resource‑circulation model.

To the relief of city officials, a much-feared waste crisis has not materialized in the first weeks of the new policy. However, they acknowledge that without major investment in incinerators and other waste infrastructure, it could become another source of political tension and regional conflict.

According to Jung Mi-sun, director of Seoul’s resource circulation division, households in the city generated about 3,000 tons of waste per day last year. On a full‑year average, roughly 67 percent of that was burned at the city’s municipal waste‑to‑energy facilities in Gangnam, Nowon, Mapo and Yangcheon districts, with the rest handled outside the city — partly at Sudokwon and the rest at private incinerators.

“So far this year, we have tightened plant operations and also because waste volumes are relatively low at the start of the year, we have been able to incinerate about 83 percent of our household waste within the city,” she told The Korea Times. “The remaining 17 percent can no longer go to the Sudokwon Landfill, so it has to go to private facilities.”

Environmental activists hold a rally near City Hall in Seoul, Dec. 15, 2025, urging city authorities to take proper measures to mitigate what they call a “waste‑dumping crisis.” Courtesy of Seoul Korean Federation for Environmental Movements

Seoul has no private incinerators, meaning the remaining 17 percent is sent to plants outside the city. While much of the waste goes to facilities elsewhere in the capital region, some contracts involve plants in other areas, fueling complaints that the principle of treating waste close to where it is produced is being abandoned.

“Even when private sector contracts are involved, we will mobilize every possible measure at our disposal to respond proactively by strictly applying emission standards and permitted capacities, and by reinforcing inspections,” said Lee Beom-seok, mayor of Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, where private incinerators take thousands of tons of waste from Seoul’s Gangnam District.

Seoul city officials counter that the amount actually sent to the provinces so far is very small. Jung said that since Jan. 1, only about 0.3 percent of Seoul’s household waste has gone to private incinerators in the Chungcheong region. Even so, she acknowledged, residents there might reasonably ask why capital-region waste should cross provincial borders at all, since the ban is supposed to push the region to solve its own garbage problems.

For Seoul, the long‑term answer is cutting down on the amount of waste generated, increasing the amount of recycling and building more incineration capacity. The city is expanding campaigns to reduce single‑use products.

Officials of the People Power Party’s Mapo District Office protest at Seoul City Hall against Mayor Oh Se‑hoon’s plan to build a new incineration facility in their district, Tuesday. Yonhap

But efforts to reduce garbage won’t be sufficient.

The city government’s four incineration plants are capable of handling about 2,850 tons per day, still leaving the city roughly 1,000 tons short of the daily incineration capacity it needs under the landfill ban. In an effort to close that gap, the city pushed to build an additional plant in Mapo, but the project has been halted due to fierce local opposition and an administrative court ruling, highlighting how politically difficult it is to secure and build such facilities.

Jung said the city government will continue to push for the project. If a new 1,000‑ton‑per‑day plant is built, she added, the city would be able to treat virtually all of its household waste without relying on other regions.

Experts say the capital area has so far narrowly avoided a full‑blown trash crisis, but warn that stopgap measures such as sending trash to other regions will not work once the direct landfill ban expands nationwide in 2030.

According to the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment, 27 new public incineration plants are currently on the drawing board in the capital region, yet only one has actually broken ground, in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. To win over residents, the Seongnam city government set up a fund to support about 500 households living within 300 meters of the site, positioning the project as a model for coexistence between residents and essential but unpopular waste infrastructure.