The three departments join forces to send a strong signal! Third-party environmental service providers should exercise self-restraint and prudence

In recent years, a small number of third-party environmental protection service agencies have blindly pursued economic interests, engaged in fraud, and helped polluting enterprises to "pass the customs" in confusion, which has seriously disrupted the order of the third-party environmental protection service market and seriously affected the scientific decision-making of the ecological environment department, which is extremely bad in nature.

Recently, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, and the Ministry of Public Security decided to jointly supervise the case of an environmental testing company in Taiyuan, Shanxi Province suspected of providing false certification documents, and a testing and calibration company in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province.

After investigation, the two companies have long carried out fraudulent acts by falsifying sampling samples, tampering with sampling times, fabricating experimental data, replacing analytical samples, etc., and issued false monitoring reports to help polluting enterprises pass the test in confusion. On suspicion of providing false documents, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has transferred the above-mentioned case to the local public security organ for investigation in accordance with the law.

The two cases were listed for supervision, sounding the alarm for more third-party environmental protection service agencies.

The problem of fraud by third-party environmental protection service agencies is frequent

In recent years, third-party environmental protection service agencies have gradually become an indispensable social force in ecological and environmental work. However, a small number of third-party service providers are driven by interests and frequently use "crooked brains".

In February this year, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment announced three typical cases of fraud by third-party environmental protection service agencies in the case of environmental monitoring fraud by Guangdong Guohuan Testing Technology Co., Ltd., the case of deliberate replacement of monitoring samples by Greenskai (Shanghai) Environmental Protection Technology Development Co., Ltd., and the case of false test reports issued by Jiangsu Nanjing Lianshun Motor Vehicle Testing Service Co., Ltd.

Of the more than 300 monitoring reports issued by Guangdong Guohuan Testing Technology Co., Ltd., 80 of them have a variety of falsification or tampering with monitoring data such as directly issuing monitoring data without sampling and analysis, deliberately untrue records or selective records of original data, inconsistent paper original records and electronic storage records, and using substitute samples for analysis, and the falsified reports involve 45 pollutant discharge units, involving an amount of 664,900 yuan.

In order to ensure that the automatic monitoring and comparison results meet the requirements, Greensky (Shanghai) Environmental Protection Technology Development Co., Ltd. deliberately replaced the samples collected on site with reconstituted gas samples during the monitoring process, and completed the monitoring, and issued a false monitoring report.

The staff of Jiangsu Nanjing Lianshun Motor Vehicle Inspection Service Co., Ltd. added a "cheat" between the vehicle OBD interface and the diagnostic equipment during the inspection, tampered with the vehicle OBD information, and made the vehicles that failed the original inspection pass the emission inspection.

In addition, since the beginning of this year, Hebei, Zhejiang, Fujian, Beijing, Ningxia and other provinces have announced typical cases of fraud by third-party environmental protection service agencies, involving the preparation of environmental impact assessment documents, environmental monitoring, environmental testing, environmental protection facility acceptance, identification and certification, carbon emission data management and many other fields. No matter in terms of the number of cases, the types of cases or the scope of cases, it shows the seriousness and complexity of the current problems of third-party environmental protection service providers.

Third-party environmental protection service providers can be criminalized for fraud

The law is the most powerful weapon to curb the fraud of third-party environmental protection service providers.

On March 1, 2021, the Amendment (11) to the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China came into effect, and environmental monitoring fraud was included in it, and the crime of "providing false supporting documents" and "issuing material misrepresentation of supporting documents" was applied.

In accordance with the provisions of Amendment (11) to the Criminal Law, personnel of intermediary organizations undertaking duties such as environmental impact assessment and environmental monitoring who intentionally provide false supporting documents, and the circumstances are serious, shall be sentenced to up to five years imprisonment or short-term detention and shall also be fined.

How does it count as "aggravating circumstances"? The "Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court and Supreme People's Procuratorate on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Handling of Criminal Cases of Environmental Pollution", which came into effect on August 15, 2023, points out that in any of the following circumstances, personnel of intermediary organizations undertaking duties such as environmental impact assessment, environmental monitoring, greenhouse gas emission inspection and testing, and the preparation or verification of emission reports intentionally provide false supporting documents, and in any of the following circumstances, it shall be found to be "serious circumstances" as provided for in the first paragraph of Criminal Law article 229:(1) Unlawful gains of 300,000 yuan or more; (2) Having previously received two or more administrative punishments for providing false supporting documents within two years, and again providing false supporting documents; (3) Other situations where the circumstances are serious.

According to public information, in the two cases that were listed for supervision, an environmental testing company in Taiyuan, Shanxi Province and a testing and calibration company in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, have long carried out fraud by falsifying sampling samples, tampering with sampling time, fabricating experimental data, replacing analysis samples, etc., and issued false monitoring reports to help pollutant discharge enterprises pass the customs in confusion.

In an interview with reporters, some legal insiders said that judging from the illegal situations pointed out in the circular and the specific requirements of the three departments for supervision, the illegal circumstances involved in the two cases may be among the "serious circumstances", and may also be used as a typical case of "the crime of providing false documents by third-party environmental protection service agencies" in the future.

The legal net is magnificent, negligent but not leaky. No matter what kind of method or means of falsification, if someone is mercenary and dares to defy the law, he will be severely punished by the law.

The Department of Ecology and Environment has always maintained "zero tolerance" for fraud

All along, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has taken a "zero tolerance" attitude and is determined to severely punish and never tolerate all kinds of fraud.

The National Conference on Ecological and Environmental Protection held in February this year proposed to "resolutely crack down on fraud by third-party environmental protection service providers".

In the same month, Huang Runqiu, Minister of Ecology and Environment, went to Pingdingshan City and Xuchang City in Henan Province to conduct surprise inspections on the implementation of the Air Pollution Prevention and Control Law and the implementation of emergency emission reduction measures for heavily polluted weather in key industries such as coking, iron and steel, and glass.

Huang Runqiu pointed out that it is necessary to adhere to the problem-oriented, dare to tackle the real problem, and resolutely investigate and deal with environmental violations in accordance with the law with a "zero tolerance" attitude, especially the problems of collusion between enterprises and third-party monitoring companies, falsification and tampering of monitoring data, etc., which are serious in nature, have a bad impact, and violate the criminal law, and must be resolutely cracked down on and give full play to the warning role.

At the local level, local ecology and environment departments have introduced a variety of measures to continuously strengthen the supervision of third-party environmental protection service providers. For example, the introduction of measures for the supervision and management of third-party environmental protection service institutions and credit evaluation measures; Carry out special rectification or law enforcement actions on the problem of fraud by third-party environmental protection service providers; investigate and deal with major cases of fraud by third-party environmental protection service providers, and publish typical cases; Organize third-party environmental protection service agencies to sign industry self-discipline commitments, requiring them to take the initiative to disclose service quality commitments, fair competition commitments, and so on.

In addition, since the beginning of this year, local ecological and environmental departments have worked closely with procuratorial organs and public security organs, continued to play their respective functions, seriously investigated and dealt with a number of typical cases, and effectively played a "combination punch" to curb the fraud of third-party environmental protection service agencies, forming a strong deterrent to illegal and criminal acts.

In the face of increasingly strict supervision, third-party environmental protection service providers need to recognize the situation, make more efforts to abide by the law and ethics, use their professional advantages in the right places, and earnestly fulfill their responsibilities of pollution prevention and self-certification in order to achieve sustainable and long-term development.