China to take targeted, scientific measures for new pollutants disposal: official

BEIJING -- China will take a targeted, scientific and law-based approach to dispose of new pollutants, according to an official with the Ministry of Ecology and Environment.

The State Council has recently released an action plan on strengthening the control of new pollutants, which aims to raise China's treatment capacity for new pollutants significantly by 2025.

"It is of significance in improving the ecological environment, promoting high-quality development and lives and ensuring people's health and ecological safety," the official said when commenting on the document.

In recent years, the ministry, along with other departments, has taken steps including standardizing risk management of toxic and hazardous chemical substances and carrying out environmental risk assessments of chemical substances to improve environmental protection, the official said, noting that these moves accumulated experience for the work on new pollutants control.

However, the official also noted that China started late in new pollutants treatment and has weaknesses in fields such as legal regulation, management, and technologies, prompting more efforts to enhance treatment capability for new pollutants.

In this regard, the action plan has outlined tasks of risk screening of some major chemicals, dynamically releasing lists of new pollutants under control, and implementing control measures, including bans and emission caps. Relative laws and systems on the risk management of hazardous chemicals will be gradually established and improved.

Generated in the production or use of hazardous chemicals, new pollutants include persistent organic pollutants, endocrine disruptors, and antibiotics. Such pollutants pose risks to the environment and human health and are hard to be treated.