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Press
Releases - 2000
Experts
to review Strategic Sewage Disposal Scheme
The six
members of an independent panel are now in town to review
the Strategic Sewage Disposal Scheme (SSDS), a spokesman for
the Secretariat of the Review Panel on SSDS said today (May
24).
The review
panel is formed to examine, based on the experience of SSDS
Stage I works, the environmental, engineering feasibility
and financial aspects of the existing plans for later stages
of the SSDS.
The review
panel will also examine alternative plans that may be submitted
by members of the public in order to make recommendations
on the most sustainable way forward on the sewage system serving
the main urban areas.
The panel
consists of international and local experts in different fields,
the spokesman noted.
Three
of them are wastewater treatment experts including Professor
Qian Yi of the Tsinghua University; Dr Albert Koenig of the
University of Hong Kong; and Professor Donald Harleman, retired
as Ford Professor of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The other
three members are Professor Sebastiano Pelizza of the University
of Technology of Turin in Italy, Professor Rudolf Wu of the
City University of Hong Kong and Professor Leonard Cheng of
the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. They are
experts in tunnelling, marine ecology and financial analysis
respectively.
The experts
today visited the Stonecutters Island Sewage Treatment Works,
a screening plant in North Point and a deep tunnel between
Kwun Tong and To Kwan Wan.
"The
six members will attend meetings of the Advisory Council on
the Environment and the Legislative Council Panel on Environmental
Affairs on May 26 and May 27 respectively.
"They
will also meet the public to receive their oral views on any
alternative to the SSDS at a public hearing on May 28," The
spokesman said.
The public
is welcome to attend the public hearing. It will start at
9.30 am at Threatre I of the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition
Centre, 1 Expo Drive, Wan Chai, Hong Kong.
Members
of the public are also welcome to send written submissions
on alternative schemes by post to the Secretariat of the Review
Panel on SSDS, GPO Box 899 or by e-mail to ssds.review@ssds.gcn.gov.hk
by June 10.
"All
verbal and written submissions will be examined by the review
panel and findings of the examination will be released by
the end of this year.
"The
administration will consider the recommendations of the review
and announce the way forward in the first quarter of 2001,"
the spokesman noted.
Information
about the review and the SSDS is available from the website
at http://www.info.gov.hk/ssds.review.
End/Wednesday,
May 24, 2000
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