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This year, a special action will be launched to severely investigate and punish environmental violations such as sewage overflow and direct discharge
Time：
2025-03-18
The Ministry of Ecology and Environment stated that a special action will be launched in 2025 to severely investigate and punish environmental violations such as sewage overflow and direct discharge.
The Ministry of Ecology and Environment stated that in 2024, the national water environment quality will continue to improve in the battle to defend the blue water. In 2025, the focus will be on strengthening the investigation and rectification of river discharge outlets, and comprehensively improving the water environment quality in China.
In the past year, China has made new progress in the battle to defend its clear waters. The proportion of surface water with excellent quality under national control has reached 90.4%, surpassing 90% for the first time, which is a landmark. However, it is difficult to fundamentally eliminate black and odorous water bodies, and blue-green algae blooms still occur frequently in some key lakes. The coordinated management of "water resources, water environment, and water ecology" is still in its infancy.
Huang Xiaosui, Director of the Water Ecology and Environment Department of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment: Pollution mainly enters the water body through river discharge outlets. At present, an important focus is to thoroughly investigate and rectify the discharge outlets into the river. These discharge outlets should be standardized, and their signage management should be one code for each outlet to achieve monitoring and traceability.
Huang Xiaosheng stated that currently, more than 330000 sewage outlets entering rivers have been inspected nationwide, and about 90% have been rectified, solving a large number of problems of direct and disorderly discharge of sewage. However, there are still problems such as uneven progress and uneven results in the investigation and rectification in various regions.
This year, a special action will be launched to severely investigate and punish environmental violations such as sewage overflow and direct discharge. At the same time, AI technology, unmanned aerial vehicle remote sensing monitoring and other means will be used to timely discover problems in the investigation and rectification of sewage outlets, ensuring the comprehensive completion of the investigation and rectification of sewage outlets in key rivers and lakes by the end of this year.
The discharge outlet into the river is the "bull's nose" for water treatment. Strengthening and standardizing the supervision and management of river discharge outlets plays an important role in improving the quality of water ecological environment, promoting green development, and protecting and building beautiful rivers and lakes.
Recently, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has formulated and issued the "Management Measures for the Supervision and Administration of River Discharge Outlets" (hereinafter referred to as the "Management Measures"), further standardizing the management and supervision of river discharge outlets, which is of great significance for achieving water land coordination, determining the shore based on water, strengthening the source control of pollutants entering the river, and protecting and improving the water ecological environment. In recent years, under the leadership of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the Huaihe River Basin Bureau has conscientiously fulfilled its responsibilities of guiding the establishment of river discharge outlets within the basin, approving and supervising the establishment of river discharge outlets within the authorized scope, and approving a total of 7 applications for the establishment of river discharge outlets, continuously promoting the "inspection, measurement, tracing, treatment, and management" of river discharge outlets. The "Management Measures" released this time have made specific provisions in Chapter 2, Articles 11 to 23, specifically for the management of the establishment of river discharge outlets, mainly reflecting the following characteristics:
Highlight key points and provide comprehensive coverage
The Management Measures classify river discharge outlets into four types: industrial discharge outlets, urban sewage treatment plant discharge outlets, agricultural discharge outlets, and other discharge outlets, covering the setting of new, renovated, or expanded river discharge outlets. All types of river discharge outlets are subject to supervision; At the same time, an approval system is implemented for the establishment of river discharge outlets for key polluting units, and a registration system is implemented for the establishment of other river discharge outlets, achieving the organic unity of "focusing on key areas" and "full coverage". According to the Management Measures, the establishment of industrial and mining enterprise sewage outlets, industrial and other types of park sewage treatment plant sewage outlets, and urban sewage treatment plant sewage outlets shall be subject to approval by the basin ecological environment supervision and management agency or local ecological environment competent department with approval authority; Unauthorized discharge of sewage through river discharge outlets is prohibited. Before setting up other sewage outlets into the river, it is necessary to submit an application for registration of the sewage outlet to the competent ecological environment department. For those that meet the requirements, the ecological environment department will confirm and register them, and include them in the management scope of the sewage outlet into the river.
In the specific process of setting up demonstration and acceptance for river discharge outlets, the management of key polluting units and industries is also emphasized. The "Management Measures" specify three situations in which the application unit for river discharge outlets needs to submit a demonstration report on the establishment of river discharge outlets. Firstly, the responsible parties belong to 12 key polluting industries such as papermaking, coking, and nitrogen fertilizer; The second is polluting units that discharge radioactive substances, heavy metals, other toxic and harmful water pollutants and other environmental risks; The third is the key polluting units whose sewage or pollutant discharge reaches the scale standards determined by the state. In the argumentation report, it is necessary to fully demonstrate the impact of setting up sewage outlets into the river on the surrounding water ecological environment and analyze the related environmental risks, propose water ecological environment protection measures, and conduct effect analysis; Those who discharge radioactive substances should also demonstrate the measures and effectiveness of radioactive substance control. Except for the above situations, for the setting of discharge outlets into rivers in other situations, only brief analysis materials need to be submitted according to regulations. Differentiated management requirements for setting up have reduced the burden on the responsible parties for other situations of river discharge outlets, avoiding a one size fits all approach.
Graded approval and unified supervision
The Management Measures implement the spirit of the central "streamlining administration, delegating powers, and improving services" reform, and reasonably divide the approval authority between the central and local governments. Considering factors such as significant environmental impact, cross regional ecological environment protection and governance, and the relationship between upstream and downstream banks, the "Management Measures" stipulate that the environmental impact assessment documents for construction projects shall be approved by the ecological environment department of the State Council. For those located in the provincial buffer zone, international rivers and lakes, or border rivers and lakes with inter provincial disputes, the approval for the setting of river discharge outlets shall be implemented by the basin ecological environment supervision and management agency of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, fully exerting the functions of guidance, coordination, and supervision of the basin ecological environment supervision and management agency; The approval for the establishment of other river discharge outlets shall be the responsibility of the local ecological environment department. At the same time, in accordance with the principle of territorial management, the river discharge outlets approved by the basin ecological environment supervision and management agency shall be included in the territorial environmental supervision and management system, which is conducive to the local people's government implementing the legal requirements of being responsible for the ecological environment quality in its jurisdiction.
The ecological environment supervision and management agency of the river basin should strengthen communication with the local authorities and fully listen to the opinions of the local people's governments on the upstream, downstream, and left and right banks where the river discharge outlet is located in the approval process. At the same time, the ecological environment supervision and management institutions in the basin should strengthen guidance on the setting of river discharge outlets within the basin, and enhance supervision on the investigation and remediation of river discharge outlets; Strengthen the supervision and management of river discharge outlets within the watershed, enhance monitoring and inspection efforts, with a focus on large-scale industrial and mining enterprises, industrial and other types of park sewage treatment plants, and urban sewage treatment plants entering river discharge outlets. Spot check the implementation of discharge control requirements, and promptly report any problems to relevant units; We should take the management of river discharge outlets as the starting point, actively promote the improvement of urban sewage collection and treatment rate, promote the control of agricultural non-point source pollution, and effectively reduce the total amount of pollutants discharged into rivers.
Information disclosure, public supervision
Public participation plays an important role in ecological environment protection. The Management Measures clarify the specific content and requirements for information disclosure in terms of the approval authority for the establishment of river discharge outlets, the decision to agree to the establishment of river discharge outlets, and the content of river discharge outlet signs. This provides convenience for the responsible parties of river discharge outlets to apply for and register their establishment, and also guarantees the public's right to know about the supervision and management of river discharge outlets. It helps guide the public to actively participate in the supervision of river discharge outlets and improve the efficiency of ecological environment supervision.
In terms of the approval authority for the establishment of sewage outlets into rivers, in December 2022, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment issued the Division Plan for the Approval Scope of the Establishment of Sewage Outlets into Rivers of the Watershed and Sea Area Bureau, which further refined and clarified the approval scope and specific boundaries of the establishment of sewage outlets into rivers of the seven watersheds and sea areas of the Yangtze River, the Yellow River, Huaihe River, Haihe River, Songliao, the Pearl River and the Taihu Lake, and made them public. According to the "Management Measures", the approval authority for the establishment of other river discharge outlets shall be determined by the provincial ecological environment department and made public to the society.
In terms of the decision to agree to the establishment of a river discharge outlet, the "Management Measures" require that the approval department issue a decision to agree to the establishment of a river discharge outlet that has been granted permission, which must be made public for public inquiry. The public content should include the responsible parties for the discharge of pollutants into the river, the types and concentrations of pollutants discharged, the total amount of emissions, the restrictions on emissions during special periods, environmental risk prevention measures, and water ecological environment protection measures. At the same time, it is required to load relevant information into the river discharge outlet signage and make it public to the society. The openness and transparency of information will facilitate on-site monitoring and supervision inspections, further enhance public attention and participation in the management of river discharge outlets, promote the implementation of responsibilities by all parties, and form a good situation of joint supervision and collaborative governance by the whole society.
The relevant person in charge of the Water Ecological Environment Department of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment stated that according to the "Management Measures", the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has developed a national information platform for the supervision and management of river discharge outlets, established and improved databases, and promoted the "one-stop" operation of the investigation and rectification, approval registration, daily supervision and inspection of river discharge outlets; The responsible party should set up signage at prominent locations such as sewage discharge points or monitoring sampling points, and actively disclose relevant information about river discharge outlets to the public through signage, display screens, QR code identification, or online media, encouraging the public and news media to supervise the discharge situation of river discharge outlets. Ecological and environmental management departments at all levels should implement "one outlet, one code" for river discharge outlets, achieve "networking, querying, and traceability", promote their supervision and management from "one outlet" to "one network", and enhance the level of digital management.
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