In today's throw-away society, dealing with the city's growing mountain of waste is an increasing challenge for the city council.
在当今的垃圾社会中，处理城市日益增多的垃圾对市议会来说是一个越来越大的挑战。
Recently, Edinburgh is faced with the problem of disposing of about 250,000 million tons of waste a year. Despite different ways to dispose of much of it in a green manner - largely through encouraging recycling - its aging facilities such as the Powderhall landfill do not have the ability to deal with it.
最近，爱丁堡面临着每年处理约25亿吨垃圾的问题。尽管以不同的方式以绿色方式处理大部分垃圾——主要是鼓励回收利用——老化设施，如Powderhall垃圾填埋场，无法处理这些垃圾。
The European Union (EU) has issued a new policy, regulating how such mountains of waste are to be disposed of. The five councils ( Edinburgh, East Lothian, West Lothian, Midlothian and Borders ) face fines around ￡18 million a year from 2013 if they don't increase recycling levels and rely less on landfill. With this in mind, the councils got together with the idea of building a large incinerator plant to burn half of the waste produced in their districts. But this plan fell apart after the change of target levels by a new UK government waste policy which required that no more than 25% of the city's waste should be disposed of in this way by 2025.
欧盟已经发布了一项新政策，规定如何处置这些堆积如山的垃圾。五个议会（爱丁堡、东洛锡安、西洛锡安，米德洛锡安和博德斯）如果不提高回收水平，减少对垃圾填埋的依赖，那么从2013年起每年将面临1800万英镑的罚款。考虑到这一点，各委员会共同提出了建造一个大型焚化炉厂的想法，以燃烧其所在地区产生的一半垃圾。但是，由于英国政府新的垃圾政策改变了目标水平，该政策要求到2025年，该城市的废物以这种方式处置的比例不得超过25%，因此该计划失败了。
After the plan was abandoned, a private company which already transported millions of tons of the city's waste by train to a landfill site near Dunbar, offered an alternative solution when it suggested opening a huge waste site near Portobello. Since Powderhall is supposed to close in 2015, it seemed necessary for the members of the Edinburgh Council to accept the suggestion. But soon they turned it down - after 700 local objections reached them - because it would have meant hundreds of lorries a day making loud noise through heavily populated areas.
该计划被放弃后，一家私营公司建议在Portobello附近开设一个大型垃圾填埋场，该公司已通过火车将城市数百万吨垃圾运至邓巴附近的垃圾填埋场。由于Powderhall计划于2015年关闭，爱丁堡议会成员似乎有必要接受这一建议。但很快，他们拒绝了——当地有700人反对——因为这意味着每天有数百辆卡车在人口稠密的地区发出巨大的噪音。
That still leaves the council with a problem. By 2013, only 50% of 1995 levels of waste will be allowed to be sent to landfill. Even if recycling targets are met, there will still be a large amount of rubbish to be burnt up. Due to this, Edinburgh and Midlothian councils have now decided to work together to build an incinerator plant as time to find a solution is fast running out.
这给议会留下了一个问题。到2013年，只有相当于1995年垃圾总数的50%允许填埋。即使达到回收目标，仍有大量垃圾需要焚烧。由于这个原因，爱丁堡和米德洛锡安议会现在决定共同努力建设一座焚烧厂，因为寻找解决方案的时间很快就要到了。
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