A Quick Snapshot of Environmental News|New Achievements in Ecological and Environmental Governance (Economic Daily)
In 2023, China will work together to promote high-quality economic development and high-level protection of the ecological environment, vigorously promote the construction of a beautiful China, and achieve new results in ecological and environmental governance.
Steady improvement in environmental quality
In 2023, the average annual concentration of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in Beijing will be 32 micrograms per cubic meter, which has been stable for three consecutive years, and "Beijing Blue" has become the norm. Liuzhou, Guangxi Province has won the national "water quality champion" for four consecutive years, and has continuously polished the golden signboard of "leading water quality" of Liujiang River.
Huang Runqiu, Minister of Ecology and Environment, said that in 2023, the situation of ecological and environmental protection will be severe and complex, and while fully supporting the overall improvement of the operation of the service economy, it will withstand multiple pressures such as extremely unfavorable meteorological conditions, and the quality of the ecological environment will be steadily improved.
In terms of air quality, the average concentration of PM2.5 in cities at and above the prefecture level in 2023 will be 30 micrograms per cubic meter, nearly 3 micrograms per cubic meter better than the annual target of 32.9 micrograms per cubic meter set in the 14th Five-Year Plan, and a decrease of 16.7% from 2019. The national rate of good days was 85.5%, and 86.8% after deducting the abnormal days of sand and dust, which was 0.6 percentage points better than the annual target (86.2%).
In terms of water environment quality, in 2023, the proportion of surface water quality excellent (Class I-III) sections will be 89.4%, an increase of 1.5 percentage points year-on-year, and the proportion of poor Class V sections will be 0.7%, unchanged year-on-year. The overall improvement trend of seawater quality in coastal waters across the country was maintained, and the proportion of excellent seawater quality (Class I and Class II) was 85%, an increase of 3.1 percentage points year-on-year.
In terms of soil environmental quality, the safe use of polluted cultivated land and key construction land across the country will be effectively guaranteed in 2023, and the national rural domestic sewage treatment (control) rate will reach more than 40%, reaching the goal of the 14th Five-Year Plan.
Fight the tough battle of pollution prevention and control
Not long ago, the third round of the first batch of central ecological and environmental protection inspectors fully completed the work of the inspector stationing stage, and publicly notified 25 typical cases of illegal sewage discharge and illegal mining of minerals in chemical parks. In the critical stage of pollution prevention and control, we will win if we advance, and if we do not advance, we will retreat, and China will continue to fight the tough battle of pollution prevention and control.
We will further promote the battle to defend the blue sky. In 2023, China will steadily promote clean heating in the northern region, complete the treatment of about 2 million scattered coal households throughout the year, complete the transformation of 420 million tons of crude steel production capacity with ultra-low emissions in the whole process, and rectify 85,000 outstanding problems of volatile organic compounds (VOCs).
Affected by the increase in the total emission of major air pollutants and unfavorable meteorological conditions, some regions will still have frequent heavy pollution weather in autumn and winter. Since the autumn and winter of 2023, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has coordinated and carried out 8 rounds of on-site and remote supervision and assistance for air pollution, found more than 16,000 problematic enterprises, and promoted the solution of more than 32,000 gas-related environmental problems.
Deeply promote the battle to defend clear water. In the past year, China has continued to carry out special actions to remediate water pollution in industrial parks in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, promoted the investigation and remediation of sewage outlets into rivers and seas, and investigated more than 250,000 sewage outlets nationwide, and completed rectification of about one-third.
Deeply promote the battle to defend the Pure Land. China continues to carry out actions to prevent and control the sources of heavy metal pollution such as cadmium in the soil of agricultural land, initiates the implementation of 124 major projects for the control of soil pollution sources, carries out remote sensing monitoring of the implementation of the safe use of soil on polluted cultivated land on a regular basis, and includes more than 9,000 plots vacated by closed and relocated enterprises into the priority supervision list.
Strengthen the treatment of solid waste and new pollutants. In 2023, 113 cities at and above the prefecture level and 8 special regions will issue implementation plans for "zero-waste cities", and more than 3,200 engineering projects will be arranged in various places, involving a total investment of more than 1 trillion yuan. In addition, China has launched a pilot demonstration of new pollutant treatment, implemented environmental risk control measures for the whole life cycle of 14 types of new pollutants, and eliminated 8 types of key controlled new pollutants. Zhejiang's "Waste-free Asian Games" action has created a new sample of low-carbon life, Tianjin has promoted the realization of cross-provincial "point-to-point" directional utilization of hazardous waste, Hainan has carried out pilot investigation and monitoring of microplastics, and the treatment of solid waste and new pollutants is achieving remarkable results.
Play a high-level protective and supporting role
In 2023, Ordos City will successfully create a National Ecological Civilization Demonstration Zone. Ordos, which accounts for one-sixth and one-third of the country's coal and natural gas reserves respectively, has made concerted efforts to promote carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion and growth, and has embarked on a new path of high-quality development guided by ecological priority and green development.
Su Yalatu, director of the Ordos Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment, introduced that the city has fully implemented the fully enclosed powder material yard and the ultra-low emission transformation of power plants and coal chemical enterprises, the crystallization of high-salt wastewater in production wastewater, and the supervision of groundwater pollution prevention and control, which has effectively promoted the adjustment of industrial structure and the upgrading of industrial level, in exchange for blue sky and white clouds.
Promoting the benign interaction of high-level protection, high-quality environment, and high-quality development, and paying more attention to source prevention, front-end emission reduction, whole-process supervision, and synergy have become the policy orientation of national environmental protection work.
In 2023, China will establish and improve the ecological environment zoning management and control system, optimize the pattern of land and space development and protection, strictly enforce environmental impact assessment access, and implement the equivalent or multiple substitution of new pollutants, carry out a new round of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei coordinated development of ecological and environmental protection planning, carry out tracking and evaluation of the implementation of the Yangtze River Delta regional ecological and environmental protection plan, promote the establishment of a cooperation and exchange mechanism for ecological and environmental protection in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and achieve full coverage of major strategic ecological and environmental protection special plans in various regions, laying a good foundation for promoting the construction of the Beautiful China Pilot Zone.
Not long ago, after pilot exploration, the eco-environment-oriented development (EOD) model ushered in new regulations. The EOD model is considered to be a model innovation that uses market-oriented means to promote ecological environmental protection, explore and improve the market-oriented allocation system of resources and environmental factors, and establish a value realization mechanism for ecological products.
Lu Yuantang, deputy director of the Department of Science and Technology and Finance of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, said that the EOD model regards ecological environment governance as an important part of industrial development projects, brings incremental benefits to industrial development through governance results, and relies on industrial income to feed back investment in ecological environmental governance, effectively solving the bottleneck of financing ecological environmental governance.
Giving full play to the supporting and guaranteeing role of high-level environmental protection, "drawing a boundary" and "adding greenery and gold" to high-quality development is promoting China's economy to achieve effective qualitative improvement and reasonable quantitative growth in green transformation and development.
