Turning waste into resources and resources into waste: Centralised waste-to-energy nexuses and alternative modes of nexusing in Hanoi

Abstract

Modern infrastructure systems serve to separate urban flows of water, sewage, waste and energy. However, ideas concerning the combination of these flows to achieve resource efficiency have shaped Hanoi’s urban planning since the colonial era. Today, dominant visions of the generation of energy from waste have led to a redefinition of what is ‘waste’ that largely ignores ‘alternative modes of nexusing’, established industries of recycling operating across the city. These industries are intertwined with and overlap provincial waste management and perpetually exist beyond state-led planning and urban–rural boundaries. The case of Hanoi reveals the exclusionary and disruptive potential of predominant visions of the urban nexus, as socio-managerial conceptions obscure and potentially displace alternative modes of nexusing. We argue that opening the view to alternative modes of nexusing as part of heterogeneous infrastructures not only challenges conventional analyses of the urban nexus that exclude marginalised practices and people, but also has important policy implications for waste management and recycling in Hanoi.

Socio-metabolic practices and heterogeneous sanitation infrastructures in urbanizing China

“…Iossifova, 2015; Pow, 2017). The complexity of embodied practices also reminds policy makers to appreciate existing socio-material contexts and the creativity of local communities, rather than solely promoting the paradigm of networked infrastructures in planning densely populated and fragmented cities (Coutard and Rutherford, 2016; Dombroski, 2015; Lawhon et al, 2018; Ren et al, 2022; Schramm and Mai, 2019).…”

“…For example, in Kampala, latrines are part of urban infrastructures that connect multiple actors and provide pathways towards a more affordable and sustainable sanitation system (Lawhon et al, 2022). In Hanoi, variegated ways of waste recycling exist beyond, and entangle with, centralized waste technologies prioritized by state-led planning (Schramm and Mai, 2019). In Shanghai, night pots are used and emptied in gutters or excrement collection stations where access to a household flush toilet is unavailable (Iossifova, 2015).…”

Towards a Postcolonial Perspective on Climate Urbanism

“…These include strategies to access electricity services on and off the grid in Maputo (Baptista, 2019) and Accra (Silver, 2015), or to manage circuits of waste in Kampala (Lawhon et al ., 2018) and Dakar (Myers, 2016). Urban infrastructures are always being made, remade and maintained through multiple practices of everyday living (Baptista, 2019; see also Kooy and Bakker, 2008; McFarlane, 2008; McFarlane and Rutherford, 2008; Furlong, 2014; Silver, 2014; Castán Broto, 2019; de Bercegol and Gowda, 2019; Guma, 2019; Schramm and Thi Thanh Mai, 2019). These analyses invite us to orient our gaze towards the many ways in which urban dwellers adapt to the constraints of their urban environment, even more so in the context of climate change.…”

The circular economy of waste: recovery, incineration and urban reuse

“…Some of these studies explicitly warn that the economic system emerging from these developments reproduces wasteful consumerism (Valenzuela and B€ ohm 2017). These studies show that circular economy discourses are having a variety of impacts on how households and municipal governments manage waste depending on the context at hand Schramm and Thi Thanh Mai 2019;Zapata and Zapata Campos 2019).…”