On August 31, 2018, the fifth session of the standing committee of the 13th National People's Congress voted to adopt the soil pollution prevention and control law of the People's Republic of China, which will take effect on January 1, 2019.
This is the first time that China has enacted a special law to regulate the prevention and control of soil pollution. It is a special law in the field of soil pollution prevention and control, following the law on water pollution prevention and control and the law on air pollution prevention and control.
The law on the prevention and control of soil pollution, consisting of seven chapters and 99 articles, stipulates, in addition to general provisions, legal liabilities and supplementary provisions, the planning, standards, general survey and monitoring, prevention and protection, risk control and restoration, guarantee and supervision of the prevention and control of soil pollution. Among them, risk control and rehabilitation also distinguish between agricultural land and construction land.
In general, the law established the soil pollution supervision unit 13 classes such as soil pollution liability subject and scope of responsibility, a new government responsibility system for the prevention and control of soil pollution, pollution liability system, environment information sharing mechanism, pollution investigation and monitoring system, the prevention and control of poisonous and harmful material system, risk control and repair system of pollution, pollution prevention and control of soil pollution risk management system such as fund system.
Second round of central environmental insp
Li gan, minister of the ministry of ecology and environment, said at the BBS annual conference on China's ecological civilization in nanjing on dec 15, 2018 that a new round of supervision will be launched in 2019 and a second round of central environmental supervision is planned to take another four years.
Mr Li also said that of the four years of the second round of central environmental inspectors, the first three were regular, comprehensive inspections, and one was "looking back". According to the plan of the central commission for comprehensively deepening reform, the next step for environmental inspectors is to solve prominent environmental problems, improve environmental quality and promote high-quality economic development.
The second round of central environmental supervision will focus on regions that have lagged behind in their work, failed to make rectification efforts and significantly reduced environmental quality, and regions that have failed to implement the "three pillars".
In addition, state and local authorities and state-owned enterprises will also be included in the supervision, and "point-and-click" and "mobile" supervision will be carried out in some key areas of pollution control.
Public participation in environmental impact assessment
On April 16, 2018, the measures for public participation in environmental impact assessment (eia) was deliberated and adopted by the executive meeting of the ministry of ecology and environment, and will come into force on January 1, 2019.
The measures have been revised to fully ensure the adequacy and effectiveness of public participation, further improve the efficiency of public participation and optimize the business environment.
The measures set a transition period that will take effect from January 1, 2019. This means that from January 1, 2019, when the construction unit applies to the competent department of ecological environment for approval of the eia document of the construction project, the relevant materials of public participation declared by it shall conform to the provisions of the new public participation method.
Since public participation in eia projects has a certain working period, relevant construction units need to carry out relevant work in advance according to the new public participation method to ensure that the provisions of the new method are met when applying for approval.
About eia public participation are implementing that were fixed way before the printing unit of eia is after January 1, 2019 of quasi approval, has been in accordance with the provisions of the interim measures within 7 days of the first disclosure, shall be approved and don't have to repeat to carry out the first information, the rest of the public participation process in accordance with the requirements for new ways to perform.
A total ban on monofluorodichloroethane has been imposed on some industries
In order to fulfill the Vienna convention for the protection of ozone layer and the Montreal protocol on ozone depleting substances, according to the relevant provisions of the regulations on the administration of the ozone-depleting substances and Chinese polyurethane foam industry hydrogen CFCS (HCFCs) elimination program requirements, promote the industry to develop in the direction of low carbon environmental protection technology, to promote industrial transformation and upgrading.
On October 18, 2018, the ecological environment printed on it is prohibited to produce with a fluorine ethylene dichloride (as - 141 - b) is a foaming agent of refrigerator freezer products, refrigerated container products, electric water heater product announcement, make clear a regulation, since January 1, 2019, no enterprise may use a fluorine ethylene dichloride (141 b) as refrigerator freezers for foaming agent production products, refrigerated container products, electric water heater products.
The announcement requires the relevant departments should actively urge enterprises to seriously implement the above provisions, earnestly do a good job in the elimination of hcfc-141b. Enterprises that use monofluorodichloroethane (hcfc-141b) in violation of the above provisions shall be punished according to law by the local competent department of ecological environment in conjunction with the relevant departments.
Three-year action plan to win the battle of the blue sky
On June 27, 2018, the state council issued the three-year action plan for winning the battle to protect the blue sky, which clearly requires that by the end of 2019, the Yangtze river delta region and the fen-wei plain will have basically completed the comprehensive improvement of "scattered pollution" enterprises and the upgrading and transformation of pollution control in key industries.
The plan also points out that from July 1, 2019, key regions, the pearl river delta region and chengdu-chongqing region will implement the national six emission standards ahead of schedule. Promoting the use of gas vehicles that meet the emission standards of the six countries.
Starting from January 1, 2019, the country will fully supply automobile gasoline and diesel that meet the six national standards, stop selling gasoline and diesel that are lower than the six national standards, realize the "tri-fuel integration" of automobile diesel, ordinary diesel and part of Marine oil, cancel the standard of ordinary diesel, and implement it in advance in key regions, pearl river delta region and chengdu-chongqing region.
Completed before the end of 2019, the key area of mobile machinery and ship pollution prevention and realize the 7-10 days of heavy pollution weather forecast ability, major pollution sources of automatic monitoring system and mobile source emission regulation ability construction, etc., and complete coating, printing ink, adhesive, detergent products such as VOCs concentration limit mandatory national standards work, July 1, 2020 in key areas take the lead in execution.
Provincial environmental protection vertical change refueling speed
On November 16, 2018, the ministry of ecology and environment issued a notice on comprehensively promoting the reform of the vertical management system for monitoring, supervision and law enforcement of ecological and environmental institutions at and below the provincial level, making it clear that the central government has agreed to comprehensively complete the implementation of the provincial environmental protection vertical reform by the end of March 2019.
"We will focus on adjusting the 'horizontal' responsibilities and staffing levels of ecological and environmental departments, monitoring, supervision and law enforcement agencies, and accelerating the implementation of the plan," the circular said.
Through the vertical management reform, it will build a big pattern of "local party committees and governments taking the lead, environmental protection departments unified supervision, and relevant departments doing their jobs". In the future, the focus of environmental law enforcement will fall to the grassroots cities and counties, and the environmental supervision functions of environmental protection departments at the municipal and county levels will rise and be exercised uniformly by provincial environmental protection departments.
"Further clarifying the direction of reform, focusing on the key points of reform, and promoting the 'triad' of environmental protection reform, local institutional reform and comprehensive law enforcement reform to ensure that 'four prominent problems' can be solved through vertical reform," the circular said. That is to build a big ecological and environmental pattern, establish a provincial "supervision" system, rationalize the monitoring system and strengthen the construction of law enforcement system.
The environmental protection reform will undoubtedly change some local environmental protection departments' disadvantages of "being both athletes and referees" and fundamentally improve the level of environmental monitoring.
Provincial environmental protection regulations
Recently, Shanxi Province issued the regulation on the prevention and control of air pollution (amendment), which has many strict regulations on the prevention and control of air pollution.
The regulation adds that "the province will implement a total coal consumption control system, gradually adjust the energy structure, and reduce the proportion of coal in primary energy consumption." It is clear that people's governments at all levels shall restrict the mining of high-sulfur and high-ash coal.
The regulations also specifically stipulate that the people's governments of cities divided into districts shall, in accordance with the requirements for improving the quality of the atmospheric environment, designate cities as coal forbidden zones and gradually expand them. The storage, sale and burning of coal and its products are prohibited in the forbidden coal areas, except for enterprises that use coal for electricity, central heating and coal for raw materials.
Strengthen bulk coal management. It is prohibited to sell or use coal that does not meet the quality standards for bulk coal for civil use, and to use lignite, medium coal, slime and other low-quality and low-quality coal as civil coal. Projects with high emissions and high pollution such as iron and steel, coking, building materials, chemical industry and non-ferrous metals within the completed urban areas shall be completed within a time limit for renovation, transformation, relocation or withdrawal.
In view of the mutual learning of local governments in policy making, similar policies are expected to be used for reference and promoted in other provinces and cities.
We will promote full coverage of the pollutant discharge permit system
In November 2016, the general office of the state council issued the implementation plan for pollutant emission control permit system, marking the implementation stage of China's pollutant emission permit system reform. Over the past year and more, the environmental protection authorities have vigorously promoted the reform of the pollutant discharge permit system, and positive results have been achieved.
In January 2018, the former ministry of environmental protection issued the measures for the administration of pollutant discharge permits (trial), which stipulates the procedures for the issuance of pollutant discharge permits, detailing the legal responsibilities of environmental protection departments, pollutant discharge units and third-party institutions, making a solid step towards the reform and improvement of the pollutant discharge permit system.
In 2019, pollutant discharge permits will be issued to all key industries involved in the tough battle against pollution, and pollutant discharge permits will be issued to pollutant discharging units with emissions of more than 80% of the key air pollutants and more than 80% of the key water pollutants.
In 2019, the ministry of ecological environment will step up supervision and law enforcement based on certificates, focusing on cracking down on illegal behaviors such as enterprises discharging pollutants without certificates, exceeding the standards and exceeding the total volume, and failing to monitor by themselves according to regulations. We will improve the environmental credit evaluation and mandatory disclosure systems for enterprises, and incorporate violations of pollution permits into the credit evaluation system. We will implement the management responsibilities of local governments and incorporate local efforts to implement pollutant discharge permit systems into the central environmental watchdog.