Make up for shortcomings, prevent risks, strengthen ecology, improve capabilities, and grasp demonstrations
The Yellow River protection and governance battle has a "combat guide"
◎Reporter Li He
The Action Plan for the Tough Battle for Ecological Protection and Governance of the Yellow River proposes that by 2025, the forest coverage rate of the Yellow River Basin will reach 21.58%, the soil and water conservation rate will reach 67.74%, 10.5 million mu of degraded natural forest will be restored, 1.36 million hectares of desertified land will be comprehensively treated, and the surface water will reach 81.9% of water bodies are better than Class III, and the water quality in the upper and middle reaches of the Yellow River reaches Class II.
The wide lake reflects the clouds in the sky, gorgeous flowers bloom on the shore, red ducks, gray geese, and swans swim by the lake... The Ruoergai grassland wetland in Sichuan Province, known as the "most beautiful wetland" in China, provides a dry season for the upper reaches of the Yellow River 40 % and 26% of the water volume in the wet season, it is the main water supply area and the key biodiversity area in the upper reaches of the Yellow River, and it is also an important part of the ecological barrier area of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.
In recent years, the environment of the Ruoergai grassland wetland in Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province has continued to improve. However, due to the complex topography, severe climate change, and frequent natural disasters, the wetlands in some areas of Ruoergai have shrunk, grasslands have been degraded, river banks have eroded, and forests have decreased. The declining trend of important ecological barrier functions such as the one has not been fundamentally changed.
In order to promote the protection and restoration of the ecosystem in the Yellow River Basin, including the Ruoergai Grassland Wetland, 12 departments including the Ministry of Ecology and Environment jointly issued the Action Plan for the Battle of the Yellow River Ecological Protection and Governance (hereinafter referred to as the Action Plan).
The Action Plan proposes that: by 2025, the forest coverage rate in the Yellow River Basin will reach 21.58%, the soil and water conservation rate will reach 67.74%, 10.5 million mu of degraded natural forest will be restored, 1.36 million hectares of desertified land will be comprehensively treated, and the surface water will reach or better than Class III The proportion of water bodies reached 81.9%, the surface water water bodies inferior to Class V were basically eliminated, the water quality of the upper and middle reaches of the Yellow River (above Huayuankou) reached Class II, and the proportion of centralized drinking water sources at the county level and above that reached or exceeded Class III was not less than 90%, and the elimination rate of black and odorous water bodies in built-up areas of county-level cities is over 90%.
The Ministry of Ecology and Environment stated that the "Action Plan" focuses on the outstanding problems of the river basin's ecological environment, making overall plans to make up for shortcomings, prevent risks, strengthen ecology, improve capabilities, and grasp demonstrations, and strive to fight the tough battle of ecological protection and governance of the Yellow River, so that the Yellow River can become a river of happiness that benefits the people. .
The water quality of the Yellow River is lower than the national average
The Yellow River is the "mother river" of the Chinese nation. The Yellow River Basin covers 9 provinces including Qinghai, Sichuan, Gansu, Ningxia, and Shaanxi.
Zhang Bo, chief engineer of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment and director of the Department of Water Ecology and Environment, said that the shortage of water resources is a prominent feature of the Yellow River Basin, and the most polluted areas of the Yellow River are in parts of the middle reaches.
How to manage the water environment and solve problems such as pollution?
Zhang Bo said that if industrial enterprises want to enter the park, the park must build centralized sewage treatment facilities to ensure stable discharge.
In addition to making up the arrears of pollution control in industrial parks, the shortcomings of urban environmental infrastructure should also be accelerated.
"Comparatively speaking, the economy of the provinces along the Yellow River is not so developed, and the local finance is not very rich. There are shortcomings in the construction of urban environmental infrastructure and the treatment of black and odorous water bodies." Zhang Bo said that some cities in the middle reaches of the city have environmental sanitation management. Extensive, dumping of sewage and garbage along rivers and even direct drainage of rainwater pipes is not uncommon. In the dry season, "staining and collecting dirt", in the flood season, "storage and collection", and the urban non-point source pollution is serious.
The central ecological and environmental protection inspector has also repeatedly reported typical cases of ecological damage in the Yellow River Basin.
For example, in the Pingluo Chemical Industrial Park in Ningxia, nearly 700,000 tons of over-standard tail water after treatment was discharged to the tail water reservoir only 2.6 kilometers away from the main stream of the Yellow River for temporary storage, and finally discharged into the external environment through leakage and other means, causing serious pollution to the Yellow River. hidden danger.
The industrial park's sewage treatment facilities have been operating abnormally for a long time, and the whereabouts of a large amount of untreated sewage is unknown.
In the Shaanxi section of the Yellow River, the inspection team found that since 2013, Hancheng, Shaanxi Province, illegally dumped about 1.26 million cubic meters of solid waste in the main stream of the Yellow River for a long time, occupying 379 mu of the river, seriously affecting flood safety and ecological functions.
Along the Shuangqiao River, a first-class tributary of the Yellow River, the problem of illegal dumping of tailings sand by enterprises is prominent.
Lu Jun, Secretary of the Party Committee of the Environmental Planning Institute of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, said that since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the management and protection of the Yellow River has made remarkable achievements, and the ecological environment of the Yellow River has continued to improve.
However, there are still some outstanding difficulties and problems in the current Yellow River Basin. The pollution of industry, urban life, agricultural non-point sources and tailings ponds, coupled with the shortage of water resources, the high development intensity of water resources, and the low efficiency of agricultural water use, make some areas have prominent pollution problems. The ecological flow of some tributaries is insufficient, and the overall water environment quality is worse than the national average.
In-depth tackling of difficulties in ecological protection and governance
"The "Action Plan" aims to tackle the difficulties and pain points of ecological protection and governance in the Yellow River Basin, and focus on solving outstanding ecological and environmental problems that the people are concerned about." Lu Jun said.
The "Action Plan" proposes five key actions for ecological protection and governance of the Yellow River, including promoting the ecological protection and governance of rivers and lakes, speeding up the "deterioration" of polluted water bodies, ensuring ecological flow, and promoting the investigation and remediation of sewage outfalls in the river; accelerating the clean production of industrial enterprises and pollution control, promote the utilization of sewage resources; promote urban sewage collection pipe network to make up for shortcomings, strengthen sewage sludge treatment and disposal, and comprehensively rectify urban black and odorous water bodies; strengthen agricultural non-point source pollution control, strengthen breeding pollution control, and speed up rural settlements Environmental improvement and improvement; maintain the function of water conservation in the upper reaches, strengthen soil erosion control in the middle reaches, strengthen comprehensive management, protection and restoration of downstream and estuaries, strengthen biodiversity protection, and implement ecological protection and restoration actions.
According to the "Action Plan", Tang Wanfeng, director of the Qinghai Provincial Department of Ecology and Environment, said that Qinghai will promote the coordinated management of the river basin environment in an all-round and whole process, focusing on effectively solving the non-point source pollution of agriculture and animal husbandry, industrial pollution and prominent urban and rural environmental problems in the basin. Coordinate and promote the joint prevention and control of water environment, air, soil, and solid waste pollution, strengthen the comprehensive improvement of the ecological environment in the mining area, comprehensively improve the environmental quality of the river basin, and maintain "the Yellow River and Qinghai in the world".
The Huangshui River is the largest first-class tributary of the Yellow River in Qinghai Province. As an important tributary of the Huangshui River, the Beichuan River was turbid and even close to being cut off due to the influence of surrounding industries, domestic sewage and garbage in the past.
Now, after governance, Beichuan River has been "gorgeously transformed".
The reporter once followed the "China Environmental Protection Century Tour" interview team and walked into the Beichuan River Wetland Park in Xining City, and saw that the pedestrian trails in the park were made of advanced water seepage materials, and the rainwater and sewage collection pipe network project was built along the river... The beach has become a green landscape ecological corridor integrating functions such as ecological protection, ecological green space, and tourist attractions.
Walking along the river, there are green grass, birds and flowers, and the scenery of lakes and mountains makes people intoxicated.
Qinghai Province also purifies the Beichuan River water by means of gradual sedimentation and plant adsorption, thereby improving the water quality of the Huangshui River.
The data shows that the water quality of the section of the Huangshui River out of Qinghai Province is 100% up to the standard of class IV water quality, and the proportion of class III water quality exceeds 50%.
Scientific and technological support to solve major ecological and environmental problems in the basin
Strengthening scientific and technological support is an important safeguard proposed in the Action Plan.
The army said that the ecological and environmental problems of the Yellow River Basin are complex, and the goals of ecological protection and governance are high. To fight the tough battle of ecological protection and governance of the Yellow River, it is necessary to strengthen regional cooperation, scientific and technological research, and market system research and support during the implementation process to ensure the smooth progress of the tough tasks. Advance implementation.
In particular, it is necessary to strengthen joint research on major issues, focus on the difficulties and key points of the Yellow River Basin, and jointly carry out key and forward-looking technologies such as water environment quality and comprehensive management, restoration of degraded ecosystems, synergy of pollution reduction and carbon reduction, and scientific response to climate change. Research on key issues to support the solution of major ecological and environmental problems in the basin.
The "Action Plan" also requires that scientific and technological innovation actions for ecological protection and high-quality development in the Yellow River Basin be carried out, a joint research platform for ecological protection and high-quality development in the Yellow River Basin should be established by relying on existing scientific research institutions, and a tracking study of "one city, one policy" should be promoted. Scientific and technological assistance actions have formed a batch of replicable and popularized river basin ecological environment governance models.
Li Yuedong, deputy director of the Sichuan Provincial Department of Ecology and Environment, said that Sichuan will build an integrated sky-ground ecological monitoring network, and regularly carry out monitoring of grasslands and wetlands; establish an automatic monitoring system for industrial pollution sources and a monitoring system for grassland ecosystem changes, grassland fires, and biological disasters; Implement a major scientific and technological project of "environmental governance and ecological protection" in alpine and high-altitude areas; establish a grid supervision system for the ecological environment, and improve the big data law enforcement supervision mechanism.
In order to protect the Ruoergai grassland wetland, Sichuan Province has implemented the "Integrated Protection and Restoration Project of the Zoige Grassland Wetland, Mountains, Waters, Forests, Fields, Lakes, Grass and Sand in the Upper Yellow River of Sichuan". The restoration project will receive 2 billion yuan of central financial subsidy funds.
The project involves 4 counties and 6 watersheds in Aba, Ruoergai, Hongyuan and Songpan in Aba Prefecture.
From 2022 to 2024, the project will implement 39 sub-projects over a three-year period to promote the ecological protection and restoration of the region in a holistic, systematic and integrated manner from the source.
After the implementation of the project, it is expected to increase carbon sequestration by 45,600 tons and water conservation by 333 million cubic meters each year, and fully restore the functions of the alpine wetland ecosystem.