The remediation of sewage outfalls into the Yangtze River has entered a deep-water period
11 provinces, 63 cities and states receive "must answer questions" for pollution interception and pollution control
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At present, the remediation of sewage outfalls into the Yangtze River has entered a deep-water period, and some difficulties have been exposed. In the future, we must face the challenges, strengthen sewage interception and sewage treatment, and solve outstanding problems such as sewage overflow and direct discharge.
Before the end of 2022, all regions along the Yangtze River must complete monitoring, traceability, build ledgers, set up signs, and issue remediation plans to ensure that all sewage outlets are "managed".
□ Our reporter Zhang Wei
Before the end of 2022, all regions along the Yangtze River must complete monitoring, traceability, build ledgers, set up signs, and issue remediation plans to ensure that all sewage outlets are "managed".
Recently, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, together with the National Development and Reform Commission, convened a meeting to promote the improvement of sewage outfalls from the Yangtze River.
The meeting made it clear that it is necessary to consolidate the foundation for the supervision and management of sewage outlets during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period.
Within the rectification scope of 11 provinces (municipalities) and 63 cities (prefectures) in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, 10 specific tasks were implemented: establishing a rectification work ledger, unifying naming and coding, conducting comprehensive monitoring, implementing sewage traceability, compiling and implementing a rectification plan, and completing tree work. Set up signs, standardize the setting of sewage outlets into the river, strengthen sewage interception and pollution control, severely crack down on violations of laws and regulations, and create a model for remediation.
Zhai Qing, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, pointed out that the remediation has entered a deep-water period, and some difficulties have been exposed. In the future, we must face the challenges head-on, strengthen sewage interception and pollution control, and solve outstanding problems such as sewage overflow and direct discharge.
More than 60,000 sewage outlets were identified
"The remediation of sewage outfalls into the Yangtze River is an important means to continue the battle to protect and restore the Yangtze River, and it is a practical need to consolidate and improve the quality of the water environment during the 14th Five-Year Plan," said Zhai Qing.
The Ministry of Ecology and Environment has always attached great importance to the remediation of sewage outfalls into rivers.
Since 2019, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has combined the improvement of sewage outfalls with the promotion of major national and regional strategies, and carried out the improvement of sewage outfalls in the Yangtze River Basin. phased results.
In the advancement of this work, the National Development and Reform Commission has also effectively played the role of the Office of the Leading Group for Promoting the Development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and actively cooperated with the Ministry of Ecology and Environment to supervise and promote the implementation of the rectification of the Yangtze River's sewage outfalls.
"The sewage outlet into the river is an important node connecting the water and the shore. The improvement of the sewage outlet is the key to identifying the 'crux' of water pollution and solving the problem of water pollution. It is very important to improve the quality of the water environment." National Development and Reform Commission Infrastructure Zhou Xiaoqi, deputy director of the Development Department, said.
According to Zhou Xiaoqi, since May last year, the Office of the Leading Group for Promoting the Development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt has focused on the important tributaries of the Yangtze River, such as the Chishui River, together with the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development and other departments to go to the provinces and cities along the Yangtze River to carry out 3 sewage discharges into the river. On-the-spot investigation of mouth rectification, in response to the problems found in the investigation, a notification and supervision letter were issued to the provinces and cities along the Yangtze River to consolidate local responsibilities and urge the rectification work.
At the same time, promote the implementation of key tasks.
Taking the rectification of prominent ecological environment problems as the starting point, urge the provinces and cities along the Yangtze River to pay close attention to the illegal sewage discharge problems disclosed in the ecological environment warning films of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, strengthen the construction of urban sewage treatment capacity, and promote the improvement of sewage discharge outlets of the Yangtze River into the river in a point-by-point manner.
Zhou Xiaoqi pointed out that the monitoring, source tracing, and remediation of the sewage outfalls in the Yangtze River have been vigorously advanced, and remarkable results have been achieved.
However, judging from the issues disclosed in the ecological environment warning film of the Yangtze River Economic Belt and the investigation by the leading group office, the current rectification of the Yangtze River sewage outfalls still faces some difficulties and problems: the number of sewage outlets into the Yangtze River is large and wide, the layout is scattered, and it is difficult to remediate The construction of environmental infrastructure in some places is not in place, the shortcomings of the supporting pipeline network are prominent, and the sewage cannot be effectively collected and treated, resulting in the overflow and direct discharge of sewage; Insufficient coordination and cooperation and ineffective work promotion have affected the remediation effect.
"These problems need to be paid attention to and solved in the next step." Zhou Xiaoqi said.
Do 10 things in 3 stages
Recently, 17 departments and units including the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Supreme People's Court, and the Supreme People's Procuratorate jointly issued the "Action Plan for Deepening the Battle for the Protection and Restoration of the Yangtze River" (hereinafter referred to as the "Action Plan"). to solve the above problems.
The promotion meeting for the improvement of sewage outfalls into the Yangtze River was also held to convey and study the spirit of the "Action Plan" to further promote the improvement of sewage outfalls into the Yangtze River.
The "Action Plan" clearly focuses on strengthening pollution interception and pollution control, and makes specific arrangements for the rectification work tasks, time schedule, and division of responsibilities.
Shi Qingmin, deputy director of the Law Enforcement Bureau of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, summarized the tasks as "10 events in 3 stages".
The first stage is "registration and filing", which includes two tasks: First, establish a rectification work ledger.
All sewage outlets are required to be classified and registered, and all of them should be included in the daily dynamic management.
The second is the unified naming code.
It is required to establish a standardized and unified "identity card" for all sewage outfalls into the river, implement "household registration" management, and do a good job of checking and verifying relevant information.
The second stage is "taking the pulse and prescribing the prescription", which includes 3 tasks.
One is to carry out comprehensive monitoring.
It is required to focus on identifying those sewage outfalls into the river and major sewage problems with large amount of sewage, poor water quality and obvious environmental impact.
The second is to implement sewage traceability.
It is required to clarify the responsible subjects, use status and sewage sources of sewage outfalls into the river one by one.
The third is to prepare and implement a remediation plan.
It is required to clarify the rectification goals, rectification requirements, specific measures, division of responsibilities, schedule and completion time limit.
It needs to be reminded here that the remediation work must ensure safety, put an end to "one size fits all" behavior, and it is strictly forbidden to merge and block urban stormwater outlets at will.
The third stage is "Enhancing Rehabilitation", which consists of 5 tasks.
One is to complete the establishment of the sign.
It is required to disclose the information of sewage outfalls into the river and accept social supervision.
The second is to standardize the setting of sewage outlets into the river, and optimize and adjust the setting of sewage outlets into the river in accordance with the requirements of "three batches".
The third is to strengthen pollution control.
"This task is the key to ensuring that the rectification work is effective, and it is the top priority of the 10 tasks." Shi Qingmin said that this task requires speeding up the construction of infrastructure to make up for shortcomings, continue to promote the improvement of sewage treatment quality and efficiency, and speed up Sewage pipe network construction and renovation, cities at the prefecture level and above will basically eliminate the direct discharge of domestic sewage, implement agricultural non-point source pollution control according to local conditions, and strengthen the management and control of industrial sewage.
Fourth, crack down on violations of laws and regulations.
It is required to strengthen the supervision and inspection of the misconnection and mixed connection of the drainage network, the mixed drainage of rain and sewage, and the random discharge of sewage, and to seriously investigate and deal with various illegal acts such as privately installed hidden pipes and direct sewage drainage by industrial enterprises.
The fifth is to create a remediation model.
All provinces (cities) are required to choose at least one prefecture and city to build a remediation model, actively publicize and popularize remediation work practices, and drive the investigation and remediation of sewage outfalls into rivers in other regions.
Post a transcript and issue a military order
Many places have expressed their willingness to implement the above tasks as soon as possible, based on the report card of the renovation of the sewage outfalls in the Yangtze River.
Ying Jianbo, deputy director of the Jiangsu Provincial Department of Ecology and Environment, revealed that up to now, Jiangsu has completed the investigation, monitoring, and source tracing of sewage outfalls in the Yangtze River. Sampling and monitoring of each sewage outlet were carried out, and all sewage outlets were traced and classified, named and coded, and a list of sewage outlets into the Yangtze River was established.
Classified renovations have been launched in an all-round way, and 9,442 sewage outlets with existing problems have been included in the renovation scope. 7,119 renovations have been completed, of which 5,369 signs have been erected, and the renovation completion rate is 75.4%.
In the first half of 2022, the Jiangsu section of the main stream of the Yangtze River maintained the Class II standard, and the water quality of the main tributaries reached 99.1%, a year-on-year increase of 2.6 percentage points.
Ying Jianbo said, "We will further find out the deficiencies, push forward the follow-up remediation work in a solid manner, ensure the effectiveness of the sewage outfall remediation, and make due contributions to the continuous improvement of the water environment quality of the Yangtze River and the realization of the eastward flow of clear water."
Chongqing adheres to a comprehensive "investigation", implements the "three-level inspection" mechanism of first-level aerial survey and inspection, second-level manual inspection, and third-level tough inspection, and actively expands the inspection scope to rivers with a drainage area of more than 1,000 square kilometers in the city. The inspection distance is from 2 along the river. The kilometers have been extended to 5 kilometers, and more than 200,000 points have been investigated in an overall manner to fully understand the bottom line.
Adhere to strict "measurement", all 2,533 sewage outfalls into the river that meet the monitoring conditions have been monitored, and all 514 sewage outfalls into the river that need to be marked are set up with signs.
Adhere to accurate "traceability" to ensure fast progress and high quality.
Adhere to long-term "governance", and carried out special water environment law enforcement actions for three consecutive years, accumulatively found more than 8,000 related problems, and filed more than 280 cases for investigation.
The Ministry of Ecology and Environment has assigned 4,014 sewage outfalls into the river in Chongqing, and a total of 3,744 remediation plans have been formulated, and the remediation work is progressing in an orderly manner.
Wan Lihua, deputy director of the Hubei Provincial Department of Ecology and Environment, said that by the end of 2021, 12,480 sewage outlets in Hubei Province have completed traceability, classification, naming and coding, and formulated a "one outlet, one policy" remediation plan. There are 1,004 non-exhaust outlets identified by the audit), accounting for 67.8%.
Wan Lihua said that in the next step, Hubei will further strengthen the rectification.
Focusing on the rectification of sewage outlets with risk of rebound, together with the provincial-level member units, we will carry out rolling and stubble-type on-site monitoring and assistance every month, and implement a closed-loop management mechanism of "supervision and assistance, assignment feedback, tracking and scheduling, and rectification and settlement".
Further strengthen rewards and punishments.
If the rectification of the problem is not strict and ineffective and the work is not advanced effectively, measures such as notification, interview or accountability shall be taken as appropriate to ensure that the rectification work is implemented and effective.
Wang Jinnan, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and dean of the Environmental Planning Institute of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, said that the discharge of "stinky water", "black water" and "rainbow water" from sewage outlets has always been a prominent water environment problem that the people have strongly reflected.
Wang Jinnan suggested that we should further consolidate the basis for the supervision and management of industrial sewage outlets and urban sewage treatment plant sewage outlets, and explore effective supervision measures such as agricultural outlets and urban rainwater outlets.
Graphics/Li Xiaojun