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7101
“Garbage Power" to Turn on the Lights at Sharon Park”
by Arutz Sheva - David Levi   
July 20th, 2009

 
The largest and most ambitious "green" project in Israel – and ranking up with the top urban reclamation projects worldwide – gets a huge boost Sunday night, when the lighting system at Sharon Park will be turned on for the first time. But the lights won't use power from the electrical grid. The system will instead be powered by the recycled trash upon which Sharon Park is being built, with bio-gasses that have been festering on the site for decades to be used to power the lights.



Sharon Park (Hiriya)

Israel news photo: ayalon-park.org.il/Eng

Development at Sharon Park, also known as the former site of the Hiriya Dump, has been underway since 2007. At 8,000 dunams, it is the largest urban green space in the country, and one of the largest in the world. Current estimates say the park will be completed only between 2015 and 2020, but various sections of the park, including the Menachem Begin Park section, have been opening slowly as development continues. Visitors can already hike or ride bikes on several footpaths and bikepaths, and a recycling museum and a small zoo are also currently open.

As befits what has turned into a worldwide symbol of urban land reclamation, the power used for the lighting system at the park will be generated by recycled garbage at the site, using the methane and other greenhouse gases generated by decomposition of the site's trash.



Attending the Sunday eve ceremony will be Environment Minister Gilad Arden, municipal officials from Tel Aviv and surrounding suburbs – and members of Ariel Sharon's family. Although Sharon is still alive (but comatose), government officials in 2007 decided to name the park after the former Prime Minister anyway, because the project was "very close to his heart," Omri Sharon said in an interview in 2007, when work on the park first began.



Biking in Sharon Park (Hiriya)

Israel news photo: ayalon-park.org.il/Eng

Hiriya was used as a dump between 1952 and 1998, and grew to encompass 112 acres, with its centerpiece a "garbage mountain" that reached 200 feet at its highest, with some 565 million cubic feet of garbage slowly decomposing underneath.

The park itself is also being developed with trash, which is being converted into mulch after recycling (and the removal of all dangerous components). According to officials in the Dan Region, the park will eventually save the Israel tens of millions of shekels, as hard-to-dispose-of items, such as building materials, will be recycled into sidewalks, pathways, and buildings in the park.

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