The Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection has recently issued a draft Measures for the Registration of Environmental Management of hazardous chemicals (hereinafter as “Measures for Environmental Management Registration”) on the 18th of October, 2011. The consultations are open to the competent authorities of environmental protection at levels of the province, autonomous region and municipality, as well as other related institutes of environmental protection inspection and supervision. Comments in written form can be sent to the Pollution Control Division of China MEP by 20 November 2011.
The draft measures are formulated in line with the State Council Decree No. 591 (Regulations on the Control over Safety of Hazardous Chemicals). Unlike Decree No. 591, which is to come into force on 1 December, 2011, the Measures for Environmental Management Registration will focus on the chemical release and migration reporting for the Hazardous Chemicals of High Environmental Concern (“HCHEC” in short). However, MEP has not determined on when the draft Measures will take effect.
The MEP is planning to establish a list of HCHEC based on the hazard properties and environmental risk levels of the hazardous chemicals.
According to the draft measures for environmental management registration, companies engaged in the production and use of hazardous chemicals should submit the application of environmental management registration to the local authorities of environmental protection at the county level. If the submitted substance belongs to HCHEC, registration certificates will be issued from the local authority at the provincial level; otherwise, certificates will be issued from the local authority at the city level. Like the practice in hazardous chemicals registration, certificates for environmental management registration has a same validation period of 3 years.
The application materials will highlight an emergency response proposal for environmental accidents, apart from basic company information and related hazard data and chemicals data that are similar to the application for hazardous chemicals registration. If a HCHEC is involved, applicants need to submit its environmental risk assessment report. This environmental risk assessment report shall include content on the environmental exposure, environmental risk assessment and a conclusion on the assessment for the HCHEC.
Companies engaged in the production and use of HCHEC should fill in a report of chemical release and migration and submit it to the local county authority on 31st January of each year. The main content of the report will include information on:
1) Emissions to the environmental media and the uncontrollable discharges of the HCHEC;
2) Migration conditions of the HCHEC;
3) Hazardous chemicals of high environmental concern (HCHEC) used in the products;
4) Calculation bases of the release and migration of HCHEC, and etc.
The draft measures also specify provisions on the choice of priority supervision objects, requirements on company supervision and inspection, information dissemination, cancellation and revocation of the certification, and penalty provisions, etc.
Terms and Definitions in the measures:
Hazardous chemicals—chemicals listed in the national Catalogue of Hazardous Chemicals.
Hazardous Chemicals of High Environmental Concern—chemicals meeting either of the following criteria: 1) chemicals that are un-degradable, bioaccumulative and can cause serious hazard to human health and living beings; 2) extremely un-degradable and extremely bioaccumulative; 3) acute toxicity or chronic toxicity to aquatic environment; 4) chemicals having extremely hazardous properties to human health or the environment; 5) chemicals subject to any international environment conventions; 6) chemicals liable to accidents and causing severe hazard to the ecological environment; 7) other chemicals which need priority control of risk reduction.
Chemical release—chemical emissions to the environmental media (such as the atmosphere, surface water and the earth, etc.) and the uncontrollable discharges of the chemical pollutants during the industrial production process.
Chemical migration—disposal or re-use of the waste water or solid waste by transferring from within the enterprise workplaces to outside the enterprise premises.
