At the 28th session of the Standing Committee of the 13th Provincial People's Congress held on March 26, Ports and Ships Pollutant Management Regulations in Zhoushan City (referred to as the Regulations) were passed unanimously and will be implemented on July 1.
The Regulations are the first local-level regulations on regulating the pollutants from ports and ships in China. It means that the Regulations fill the gap in the upper law and provide a clear legal basis for the seamless transfer for the pollutants from ports and ships to the land. The Regulations stipulate that pollutants from ports and ships that do not meet the discharge requirements should be classified, received and transferred to the land. Besides, the Regulations set up the listing mechanism for the pollutants transfer. During the pollutant disposal operations, relevant operator should fill the list, which includes the type, amount and the disposal method of the pollutants, during pollutants receiving transferring and disposing operations. The lists are shared by supervision departments. For those who fail to follow the mechanism, the Regulations also stipulate the corresponding penalties for different situations and subjects.
"The blind spots in the supervision of pollutant receiving has been eliminated. It has also formed a closed-loop management of the whole process of ports and ship pollutants." Said Yu Caibin, deputy investigator of the Municipal Bureau of Ecological Environment. He also noted that the biggest challenge for maritime pollution disposal is that the pollutants are being made offshore but disposed onshore. We have sound legal system both on land and at sea. However, there is still a blank area, lack of upper-level law and loophole on the boundary. The Regulations are made for filling them.
Relevant persons in charge of the Zhoushan Port and Shipping Bureau and Zhoushan Maritime Safety Administration also stated that the corresponding penalties in the Regulations have solved the embarrassment of punishing violation activities in the handover link and provide a strong legal support for law enforcement.
"That's a good thing, a great thing! Fu Hongguo, deputy general manager of Zhoushan Magellan Environmental Technology Co., Ltd., applauded after hearing the Regulations has passed. This company has imported the world's top technology to build a factory, focusing on the harmless disposal and utilization of sludge and residual oil, in Liuheng, which will start its trial production in early July. Fu Hongguo believes that the Regulations can effectively promote the standardization of ports and ships pollutant disposal. He suggested that law enforcement be stepped up after the regulations are implemented.
Zhoushan is located at the intersection of the North-South Maritime Channel and the Golden Waterway of the Yangtze River. In 2020, the cargo throughput reached 570 million tons, which is increasing year by year, and there are about 800,000 ships of various types entering and leaving the port. At the same time, the amounts of pollutants produced by ports and ships has been high all the time, about 200,000 tons in 2020, which mainly includes oily sewage, ship garbage, and domestic sewage. According to the survey, the water quality in the coastal waters of Zhoushan is in polluted situation. The 4th-level polluted water accounts for a large proportion.
Zhoushan City has explored the solution in dealing with the pollutants receiving and disposal from port ships earlier.
In 2017, it launched a receiving and disposal listing mechanism. After that, the management capabilities have been significantly improved but problems such as the imperfect regulatory system need to be resolved urgently. It is particularly urgent and necessary to clarify department responsibilities, strictly control the whole process, and improve the supervisory system from the institutional level. To achieve that goal, the Regulations were drafted by the Zhoushan City Ecological Environment Bureau and completed in June 2020. The Standing Committee of the Seventh People's Congress of Zhoushan City conducted two deliberations and voted on it at the 37th session of the Standing Committee of the Seventh People's Congress of the same year. The Regulations are divided into six chapters and forty-two articles, which clarify the management, transfer, secure measures and legal responsibilities of ports and ships pollutants.