Special Campaigns of Environmental Protection
Eight Departments of the State Council Jointly Held 2008 Teleconference on Special Campaigns of Environmental ProtectionMEP, NDRC, Ministry of Supervision, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Housing and Urban and Rural Construction, State Administration of Industry and Commerce, State Administration of Work Safety and State Electricity Regulatory Commission jointly held 2008 national teleconference on special environmental protection campaigns on streamlining enterprises that discharge pollutants against the law and safeguarding public health in Beijing today. The meeting summarized the achievements over the past 5 years, made specific arrangements on the special environmental protection campaigns in this year and the nest 5 years and commended the units and individuals with excellent performance. Mr. Zhou Shengxian, Minister of MEP on behalf of the eight developments of the State Council stressed in his speech that we should earnestly materialize the instruction of Vice Premier Li Keqiang, focus on addressing pre-eminent environmental problems that threaten public health and affect sustainable development, further enhance our efforts in environmental law enforcement and practically ensure public environmental rights & interests.
At the meeting, Minister Zhou Shengxian passed the important instruction of Mr. Li Keqiang, member of Political Bureau of CCCPC and Vice Premier of the State Council on streamlining enterprises that discharge pollutants against the law and ensuring public health and summarized the special environmental protection campaigns over the past 5 years on behalf of the eight developments. He said, under the unified leadership and arrangements of the State Council, MEP and NDRC together with Ministry of Supervision, Ministry of Justice, State Administration of Industry and Commerce, State Administration of Work Safety and State Electricity Regulatory Commission have strengthened organization and instruction, set up coordination mechanism, carried out special environmental protection campaigns and played an active role in facilitating scientific development and promoting social harmony over the past 5 years. First, relevant authorities have made more efforts in investigating and punishing environmental infringement to control the rising trend of enterprises that discharge pollutants against the law. A total of over 7 million person?times of law enforcement staff have been mobilized over the past 5 years with more than 3 million unit?times of enterprises inspected over 120,000 unit?times of enterprises in violation of environmental laws sanctioned and over 20,000 enterprises banned or shut down due to illegal discharge of pollutants. This has greatly deterred environmental infringements. Second, MEP has focused on its efforts in addressing pre-eminent environmental problems that threaten public health to safeguard public environmental rights and interests. A total of over 15000 collected drinking water source areas have been checked. All pollution outlets from industrial enterprises in Grade I protected areas have been shut down and illegal construction projects in Grade II protected areas have been cleaned up and rectified. Environmental safety risks in the protected areas have been basically eliminated. More than 96% environmental complaints have been addressed in time. Third, the authority has made more efforts in phasing out lagging-behind productivity and facilitated emission reduction. In 2007, it banned and shut down 1120 paper making manufacturers, phased out 2.6 million t lagging-behind productivity and reduced COD discharge by over 600,000 t. Fourth, the authority has focused on the control of pollution in key regions and industries. The environmental quality of such regions as the "black triangle" in border areas among Shanxi Province, Shaanxi Province, Inner Mongolia and Ningxia and the "manganese triangle" among Hunan, Guizhou and Chongqing has been improved.
Minister Zhou Shengxian pointed out that over the past 5 years, special environmental protection campaigns have become an important measure for the promotion of environmental protection work and achievement of environmental protection objective; an important tool to strengthen macro regulation and facilitate scientific development; an important approach to standardize market order and improve market economy system and an important force for safeguarding public environmental rights & interests and promoting the development of harmonious society with the efforts of all regions and developments. However, we must clearly understand that current environmental infringements are rather common and environmental situation is still very grave. We must continue our special environmental protection campaigns, take stronger rectification measures, safeguard public environmental rights & interests and provide good environment for the promotion of sound and fast economic and social development.
Minister Zhou Shengxian said, the special environmental protection campaigns in the next five years should continuously focus on the addressing of pre-eminent environmental problems that threaten public health and affect sustainable development. Our future main tasks include the followings:
1) Carry out collective rectification and control of environmental infringements of key industries centering on achieving the task of emission reduction. We must take pollution prevention and control of 12 industries including power, iron & steel and building materials with high energy consumption and pollution as the focus for the supervision of law enforcement and intensify the supervision and inspection on the control of total discharge of pollutants from industrial enterprises and the implementation of pollution discharge license system. We will choose 1-2 heavy-polluting industries each year to carry out collective rectification and control, seriously crack down environmental infringements so as to minimize the discharge of pollutants.
2) Conduct collective addressing of environmental infringements in drinking water source areas focusing on safeguarding public environmental rights & interests. We will finish the zoning and adjustment of protected areas for drinking water source in an all round way, firmly ban all pollution outlets within the protected areas according to law and ensure that 100% of major indicators for collective drinking water source areas of 113 key cities on environmental protection will meet national standard by the end of this year. We will carry out collective rectifications to eliminate hidden environmental safety risk that probably affect water quality of the drinking water source areas and put an end to major pollution accidents. Local EPAs of May 12 earthquake hit areas including Sichuan Province shall rule out all hidden risks that may lead to environmental pollution accident and ensure the safety of the water in drinking water source areas as well as environmental safety of nuclear facilities.
3) Carry out collective rectification and control of environmental infringements of key river basins to let all rivers, lakes and seas restore their ecological system which cannot tolerate any more pollution. We will take the three lakes (Taihu Lake, Chaohu Lake and Dianchi Lake) and major lakes and reservoirs including the 7 lakes & reservoirs (the Three Gorges Reservoir, Xiaolangdi Reservoir, Danjiangkou Reservoir, Hongze Lake, 鄱阳湖, Dongting Lake and Erhai Lake) as well as key river basins including the Huaihe River, Liaohe River, Haihe River and Songhua River as the key targets for pollution prevention and control; strengthen supervision and inspection; urge local governments at all levels to improve the target responsibility system for watershed pollution control and the examination system for water quality of trans-province river sections and materialize all policy measures for ecological restoration.
Minister Zhou Shengxian said, based on work arrangements decided by the inter-ministry joint meeting of eight departments of the State Council on special environmental protection campaigns, we will focus on our efforts in the following three issues in 2008: 1) Concentrate on the supervision on the follow-up activities of special environmental protection campaigns aiming at consolidating the rectification achievements. That is, we will carry out supervision on the implementation of rectification of measures for environmental infringement cases and pre-eminent environmental issues found during the special environmental protection campaigns, and the implementation of control measures in drinking water source areas of 113 national key cities on environmental protection as well as the follow-up measures for cutting the power and water supply and dismantling of equipment of the banned or shut-down enterprises (production lines). In case of rectification not in place and failure of pollution treatment, relevant enterprise shall stop operation and make rectifications. 2) Conduct collective special inspections on key industries including urban sewage treatment plants and landfill facilities aiming at facilitating the target of emission reduction. We will seriously investigate and sanction environmental infringements such as direct discharge of waste water even though waste water treatment plant is set up, discharge of waste water not meeting the standard and direct sludge discharge and fully investigate such aspects as the scale, anti-seepage measures and leachate discharge of existing landfill facilities. 3) Focus on special control of polluting enterprises in major river basins aiming at ecologically restore all rivers, lakes and seas no longer tolerate any more pollution. We will order the enterprises that still discharge water pollutants beyond national pollution discharge standard in the watersheds of the "three lakes" to stop operation for rectification or shut down according to law. We will check the enterprises in heavy-polluting industries including paper making, tannery, printing & dyeing and brewery not in line with national industrial policy and order according to law the shutting down of lagging-behind productivity. We will order the cease of operation of the construction projects that have not finished the construction of the prevention and control facilities of water pollution, not passed check & acceptance or put into operation even though it fails to pass the check & acceptance since 2007 .
Minister Zhou Shengxian requires that all provinces and relevant departments should strengthen their leadership, closely cooperate with each other, carry out responsibility, develop concentrated rectification force, strive for improving the level of special environmental protection campaigns and ensure real achievements of the special campaign.
At the meeting, Mr. Ma Liqiang, Vice Secretary General of NDRC, Vice Minister Hao Mingjin of Ministry of Supervision and Vice Minister Zhang Lijun of MEP presented their requirements for the implementation of special environmental protection campaigns. Mr. Ma Liqiang required that economic development and reform departments and economic and trade departments at all levels shall focus on energy reduction and emission reduction work, firmly curb too fast growth of the industries with high energy consumption and pollution discharge; and strictly manage new construction projects. We will not approval any projects failing to go through EIA review & approval procedures according to law. We will take comprehensive measures and earnestly organize well 2008 plan for phasing out of lagging behind productivities in heavy-polluting industries with high consumption of energy such as cement and coking industry. Mr. Hao Mingjin said, supervision departments at all levels shall combine the special environmental protection campaigns with the supervision and inspection on the implementation of the policy measures for energy saving and emission reduction and ensure all relevant work are in place and all responsibilities are fully investigated. We will focus on the investigation and sanction of environmental infringements, any conduct that shield or countenance law infringement and any case that damages public environmental rights & interests; and strive for addressing such issues as environmental infringements and poor supervision by local governments in order to make contributions to the achievement of the target of emission reduction. Vice Minister Zhang Lijun of MEP pointed out that environmental protection departments at all levels shall earnestly fulfill their responsibilities, bring their leading role into play, make further efforts in environmental supervision and establish well-developed inter-ministry joint coordination mechanism in accordance with the arrangements and requirement of this meeting. At the same time, we will intensify our work of public supervision and media publicity and disclose various conducts that goes against law & regulations in time.
At the meeting, Vice Minister Liu Yuting of State Administration of Industry and Commerce read out the Decision on Commending Advanced Units and Individuals in Special Environmental Protection Campaigns on Streamlining Enterprises That Discharge Pollutants against the Law and Ensuring Public Health on behalf of the 8 developments of the State Council and commended 116 national advanced units and 598 advanced individuals.
The meeting was chaired by Vice Minister Sun Huashan of the State Administration of Work Safety with more than 2000 sub-meeting sites in all province, autonomous regions and municipalities across China and Xinjiang Production Corps. Over 65,000 heads of local governments in charge of environmental protection and heads of relevant departments attended the meeting.
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