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On November 26, 2021, a virtual forum on ‘new pollutants treatment’ was held by the Chemical Safety Civil Partnership Network (CSN) and REACH24H, in which experts, enterprises and NGOs were invited to shared and exchanged their opinions on the new pollutants management.
Background
The concept of ‘New Pollutants’ has been proposed in China since 2018. In 2020, China’s 14th Five-Year Plans (2021-2025) stipulated that bigger focus should be placed on the treatment of new pollutants. Such requirements on new pollutants treatment have been reaffirmed in many official documents in 2021. More specifically, the Opinions on Further Promoting the Nationwide Battle to Prevent and Control Pollution, which was jointly released the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the State Council on November 2, 2021, reaffirmed the target of strengthening the new pollutants treatment once more. However, so far there is no corresponding legislation except for the draft Action Plan for New Pollutants Treatment issued in October this year (ChemLinked news).
The production and use of chemical substances are the sources of new pollutants. Most new pollutants, even if with a low concentration, may pose severe environmental and health risks. Given increasing concern about new pollutants, it is imperative for China, as one of the world’s major gathering regions for the research, production, import and processing of chemicals, to promulgate special laws and regulations for the environmental management of chemical substances. In 2019, with the ambition to comprehensively manage both existing and new chemicals in China, the Regulations on Environmental Risk Assessment and Control of Chemical Substances[1] was drafted. However, its legislation process faced stagnation due to some difficulties. Given the opportunity of strengthening new pollutants treatment, the regulation will be renamed as Regulation on Environmental Management of Toxic and Hazardous Chemical Substances, with the applicable scope narrowed down to focusing on toxic and hazardous chemicals that are the main sources of new pollutants.
Major Highlights
Difficulties in legislation and enforcement
At the forum, Ms. Nelly Chen, a senior regulatory consultant from REACH24H pointed out the major difficulties in introducing of the Regulation. The Chinese Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) really expects to promote this legislation. However, it may bring huge impact on chemical industries, especially small and middle-sized enterprises, of which compliance costs may be increased and production of certain chemicals may be prohibited/restricted. Besides, the MEE told ChemLinked that to formulate such a superordinate legislation involves various departments, among which managements are scattered and a cross-departmental coordination mechanism for the treatment of chemical substances hasn’t yet been developed, thus it’s hard to form a joint force to promote the legislation.
Regarding the assessments of chemical substances, some enterprises attended the forum came up with the question ‘why does the evaluation process so slowly, only 5-10 substances per year’. Ms. Nelly Chen shared that there were enterprises once joined the official pilot project on risk assessments of 23 chemical substances (ChemLinked news). They disclosed hazards and uses information and made great efforts to facilitate the authority in conducting risk assessment, while the outcome is not beneficial to their businesses, which significantly reduce enterprises’ willingness to participate in the future. Moreover, to conduct such assessments requires high-tech screening equipment and professionals. If all the workload to be fulfilled solely by the officials without cooperation, the assessment process is inevitable to be slow down.
What can be done?
Mr. Mao Da, an expert from Toxics-Free Corps, pointed out that many countries, like the United States and Canada, have mature mechanisms and rich experience in chemical assessments, China can learn from their assessment methods, working routines, models, etc. to speed up the process based on the national conditions.
As the foregoing statement, ‘New Pollutants’ is a very new concept in China. Stakeholders including NGOs, enterprises, consulting groups, etc. expect to be more engaged in shaping the management rules, however, the participation and supervision of new pollutants treatment rely on how the corresponding legal system is established, stated by Mr. Mao. When there’s a clear framework, stakeholders can get a better view of what they can do.
Meanwhile, Mr. Mao also introduced some suggestions for the legislation. More specially, information sharing among different departments on risks of new pollutants and information disclosure of relevant chemical substances is required, and a grace period shall be set for enterprises to make corresponding adjustments before the enforcement of the regulation, etc.
