EVEREST TURNS INTO HIGHEST RUBBISH DUMP
KATHMANDU: Decades of commercial mountaineering have turned Mount Everest into the world’s highest rubbish dump as an increasing number of big-spending climbers pay little attention to the ugly footprint they leave behind.
Fluorescent tents, discarded climbing equipment, gas canisters and human excrement litter the welltrodden route to the summit of the 8,848-metre peak.
As the number of climbers on the mountain has soared — at least 600 people have scaled the world’s highest peak so far this year alone — the problem has worsened.
Meanwhile, melting glaciers caused by global warming are exposing trash that has accumulated on the mountain.
Efforts have been made. Five years ago Nepal implemented a $4,000 rubbish deposit per team that would be refunded if each climber brought down at least 8 kg of waste. On the Tibet side of the mountain, they are required to bring down the same amount and are fined $100 per kilogramme if they don’t.
In 2017 climbers in Nepal brought down 25 tonnes of trash and 15 tonnes of human waste. This season even more was carried down but this is just a fraction of the rubbish dumped each year, with only half of climbers lugging down the required amounts, the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee says.
The Everest industry has boomed in the last two decades. This has sparked concerns of overcrowding as well as fears that ever more inexperienced mountaineers are being drawn by low-cost expedition operators desperate for customers.