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The first Ecological Environment Code of the People's Republic of China will come into effect on August 15, 2026!

Time：

2026-08-12

The Ecological Environment Code of the People's Republic of China, as the first legal code in the field of ecological environment in China, will come into effect on August 15, 2026. This code consists of 5 parts, 37 chapters, and 1156 articles, with each part consisting of general provisions, pollution prevention and control, ecological protection, green and low-carbon development, legal responsibilities, and supplementary provisions. On the day of implementation, 10 laws including the Environmental Protection Law of the People's Republic of China were simultaneously abolished.

The Ecological Environment Code of the People's Republic of China, as the first code in the field of ecological environment in China, was officially adopted on March 12, 2026, and will come into effect on August 15, 2026. This code is the second law named "Code" after the Civil Code, marking the entry of China's rule of law in ecological civilization construction into a new era of codification. The code consists of five parts, 37 chapters, and 1,156 articles, with the parts sequentially covering general provisions, pollution prevention, ecological protection, green and low-carbon development, legal liability, and supplementary provisions. On the day of its implementation, 10 laws including the Environmental Protection Law of the People's Republic of China will be repealed simultaneously.

Core Framework of the Code

The 2026 version of the Ecological Environment Code of the People's Republic of China adopts a "moderate codification" model, integrating and optimizing previously scattered ecological environment related laws and administrative regulations, forming a logically unified and systematically complete 5-part structure, with clear core positioning for each part, covering the entire field of ecological and environmental protection:

1. General Provisions: A guiding chapter that clarifies the legislative purpose, scope of application, and core principles such as "protection priority, prevention first". It incorporates the "three lines and one order" into the core system, clarifies the ecological and environmental protection responsibilities of governments, enterprises, and citizens at all levels, and lays the foundation for the entire code.

2. Pollution Prevention and Control Section: The core governance chapter covers the entire field of air, water, soil, solid waste, noise, radiation, new pollutants, etc. It refines pollution prevention and control standards and requirements, fills in legislative gaps in new fields such as light pollution and electromagnetic radiation;

3. Ecological Protection Edition: Comprehensive Protection Chapter, focusing on various ecosystems such as forests, grasslands, wetlands, oceans, etc., strengthening biodiversity conservation, protecting important geographical units (such as the Qinghai Tibet Plateau), and improving the ecological restoration system;

4. Green and Low Carbon Development Compilation: The world's first independent compilation, incorporating carbon peaking, carbon neutrality, and climate change response into the legal track, regulating green and low-carbon transformation, circular economy development, and building a market-oriented institutional system for low-carbon development;

5. Legal responsibility section: Rigid protection chapter, significantly increasing the upper limit of punishment, adding multiple accountability clauses, distinguishing between illegal subjects and circumstances, setting differentiated penalties, improving the system of ecological environment damage compensation and public interest litigation, and strengthening legal deterrence.

Five Breakthrough Highlights

Reshaping the legal framework of ecological and environmental protection, compared to previous scattered ecological and environmental legislation, the breakthrough highlights of this code are particularly prominent. Each item demonstrates China's determination and progress in ecological governance, and is closely related to the development of various industries

Highlight 1: The world's first independent compilation of green and low-carbon development, incorporating carbon peak and carbon neutrality into the legal track, clarifying core systems such as carbon emission trading and product carbon footprint management, and promoting the transformation of ecological governance from "end of pipe remediation" to "source prevention".

Highlight 2: Fill multiple legislative gaps, add specialized provisions for the prevention and control of light pollution and electromagnetic radiation pollution, clarify legal responsibilities for light pollution (such as advertising screens and light boxes), and respond to the ecological and environmental demands of the public.

Highlight 3: Comprehensive upgrading of penalties, significantly increasing the upper limit of fines for key illegal acts (such as raising the upper limit of fines for radioactive waste gas and liquid discharge to 2 million yuan), adding accountability clauses for illegal acts such as diluting and discharging toxic and harmful industrial wastewater, and strengthening rigid deterrence.

Highlight 4: Strengthen the protection of the entire system, add special protection clauses for important geographical units such as the Qinghai Tibet Plateau, clarify prevention and control measures for "human animal conflicts", and establish the principle of "natural restoration as the mainstay and artificial restoration as the supplement" for ecological restoration.

Highlight 5: Unify industry standards, abolish 10 core laws such as the Environmental Protection Law and the Water Pollution Prevention and Control Law, integrate their core contents into the legal code, end the situation of "multiple supervision and chaotic basis", and achieve systematic and unified ecological and environmental protection standards.

Code Implementation Requirements

One is to continue to deepen the fight against pollution prevention and control. The Code requires precise, scientific, and lawful pollution control to achieve synergistic efficiency in reducing pollution and carbon emissions. We will deepen the defense of blue sky, clear water, and clean land in accordance with the law, protect the marine ecological environment, implement comprehensive solid waste management actions, promote the treatment of new pollutants, strengthen the unified supervision and management of radioactive pollution prevention and control, effectively solve environmental problems such as noise, catering fumes, and odors at the doorstep of ordinary people's homes, and continuously improve the quality of the ecological environment.

The second is to strengthen ecological protection and restoration supervision. The Code requires strengthening ecological protection, enhancing ecosystem diversity, stability, and sustainability, and maintaining ecological security. We will strictly implement the ecological protection red line management system, conduct evaluations of the effectiveness of ecological protection and restoration, strengthen the investigation and rectification of ecological damage problems, solidly promote major projects for biodiversity conservation, strengthen the governance and ecological protection of important river, lake and reservoir systems, and safeguard the natural ecological security boundary.

The third is to promote the comprehensive green transformation of economic and social development. The Code requires accelerating the formation of spatial patterns, industrial structures, production methods, and lifestyles that are conducive to resource conservation and ecological environment protection. We will take carbon peak and carbon neutrality as the driving force, actively address climate change, and promote green and low-carbon transformation in key areas such as industry, urban and rural construction, transportation, and energy. Deepen the management and control of ecological environment zoning, improve policies such as finance, taxation, investment, pricing, and environmental protection to promote green and low-carbon development, promote green and low-carbon lifestyles, and make green a distinctive background for high-quality development.

The fourth is to strictly regulate the supervision and law enforcement of ecological environment. On the basis of current legal provisions, the Code scientifically and reasonably sets legal responsibilities in response to new situations and problems in law enforcement and judiciary in the field of ecological environment, and promotes the construction of a more unified, complete and standardized legal responsibility system. We will deepen the supervision of central ecological environment protection, promote the implementation of the ecological environment protection responsibility system for local party and government leaders, accelerate the construction of a smart law enforcement system for ecological environment, strictly regulate fair and civilized law enforcement, and promote the stable and far-reaching construction of a beautiful China with good laws and good governance.

Core meaning

The implementation of the Code has an impact on every subject. The implementation of this Code is not only a milestone in the history of ecological and environmental protection legislation in China, but also closely related to the behavior of the government, enterprises, and citizens. Its role in regulating and leading environmental protection related industries is particularly significant.

For the government, clarifying the legal responsibilities of ecological environmental protection forces all levels of government to coordinate the promotion of pollution prevention and control, ecological protection, and green low-carbon development, and strengthen cross regional collaborative governance;

For enterprises, a compliance bottom line for ecological and environmental protection has been established, especially for high polluting and high emission enterprises, which need to strictly comply with various control requirements, resulting in a significant increase in the cost of violations;

For citizens, the rights and obligations of ecological environmental protection have been clarified, ensuring the public's right to environmental information and supervision, while guiding citizens to practice green lifestyles and jointly safeguard the ecological environment.

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