Ministry of Environmental Protection plans to push air quality "one vote veto"

To further promote inter-provincial cross-regional air pollution prevention and joint prevention and control work, the Ministry of Environmental Protection is formulating assessment methods involving 19 provinces, including air pollution treatment project operating rate, vehicle yellow label vehicle elimination rate and tail gas detection rate, etc. Indicators, and strive to implement a one-vote veto system for air quality.

It is reported that in the assessment methods being formulated by the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the “planned annual assessments” and “final assessment results” will be reported to the State Council as an important basis for the comprehensive evaluation of local government leadership at all levels and an accountability system will be implemented. In cities where the development of the project is slow and the atmospheric environment is seriously polluted, environmental engineering evaluations for phased construction projects are limited.

On the eve of this round of long-term, large-scale, and heavily polluted weather, the three ministries and commissions of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the National Development and Reform Commission, and the Ministry of Finance issued the “12th Five-Year Plan” for the prevention and control of atmospheric pollution in key regions. As early as 2010, the Ministry of Environmental Protection and other nine ministries jointly issued the “Guidance Opinion on Advancing Joint Prevention and Control of Air Pollution and Improve Regional Air Quality,” and banned the construction and expansion of steel, nonferrous metals, petrochemicals, and cement in urban areas and its suburbs. Heavy chemical companies such as chemical industry.

However, from the public information of the local government this year, many of them have “into ink” heavy chemical projects. These areas are precisely the areas that have been plagued by haze days in January, and are also “Air Pollution Prevention in Key Areas”. The area covered by the 12th Five-Year Plan. For example, Hebei emphasizes accelerating the construction of 10 million tons of PetroChina Huabei Petrochemical Refinery and China Coal Science and Technology Tangshan coal machinery equipment manufacturing projects; Lanzhou proposes to strive to build and commission heavy construction projects such as Tiejian Heavy Industries, and to do a good job in connection with China Chemical Industry and Liugong Machinery. Project; Wuhan proposed to ensure that 800,000 tons of ethylene, 8 million tons of oil refineries and other projects will be completed and put into operation, and a series of projects such as methanol and olefins will be signed and settled down.

According to a professor at the Environmental College of Tsinghua University who accepts the decision-making consultation of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the air quality in the central cities of these regions is already not very good. The above-mentioned new projects are tantamount to "intensifying the situation." He believes that the above-mentioned areas should implement reduction and replacement measures of “increasing production and reducing pollution” as soon as possible, that is, the increase in pollutant emissions from new projects must be replaced by 1.5 to 2 times the reduction in pollutants from other projects in the area. He said that northern cities with dry climate and poor self-purification of the atmosphere must strictly limit heavy chemical projects.

It is difficult to solve the regional atmospheric environment problems by "respecting each other." The Minister of Environmental Protection, Zhou Shengxian, announced on the 4th in his speech at the 2013 National Environmental Protection Working Conference, said that in the inter-provincial regions of Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei and the Yangtze River Delta, the establishment of a department headed by the Ministry of Environmental Protection and related provincial and provincial governments will be considered. Air pollution joint prevention and control work leading group.

“The cities most affected by the ashes last month are not precisely the regional center cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, but the second and third tier cities such as Shijiazhuang and Handan. Therefore, the participation of cities in joint defense and joint control is not only to protect others, but also to protect them. Own.” Chai Fahe, deputy director of the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Protection of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, said in an interview with an economic information reporter.

Chai Fahe said that there are two wrong tendencies in the treatment of atmospheric pollution in some regions: First, developed regions rush to “throw out” some high-polluting industries, regardless of whether or not the surrounding areas have environmental carrying capacity; First, underdeveloped regions are large projects. The taxation, employment, and GDP drivers are very "hungry", first landing and then supervising, first pollution and then governance.

Chai Fahe believes that, on the one hand, industrial transfer cannot be transformed into pollution transfer. Only under the premise of industrial upgrading and technological transformation, less developed regions can inherit industries in developed regions. On the other hand, developed regions should provide assistance in the prevention and control of atmospheric pollution and adjustment of industrial structure in underdeveloped regions, including the consideration of the establishment of regional air pollution control, which will be funded by the central government, and share the transition costs among various localities in the region. .

The desire to “overtake the corners in underdeveloped regions” is understandable, but if you strictly encourage the launch of heavy pollution projects such as steel, non-ferrous metals, petrochemicals, cement, and chemicals, you will have to pay a heavy price for environmental management and ecological restoration.” An expert from the Planning Institute said.