Polluters warned of price ‘too high to bear’
Print Edition
POLLUTERS will pay a price “too high to bear” for their illegal acts, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang warned yesterday.
All businesses involved in illegal production and emission, no matter what kind they are, will be brought to justice and held accountable, Li told a press conference after the annual national legislative session concluded.
He made the remarks in response to a question on whether two Chinese oil giants, Sinopec and PetroChina, had obstructed the implementation of environment policies in the country.
“We need to make the cost for doing so too high to bear,” the premier said.
He said the government would this year be focusing on fully implementing the newly-revised Environmental Protection Law.
More support will be given to environmental law enforcement departments, he said.
“No one should use his power to meddle with law enforcement in this regard,” Li said.
However, he stressed that law enforcement departments should also have the courage to take charge and fulfill their duties while any failure to act, abuse of power or breach of duty would be punished.
The law must work as a powerful, effective tool to control pollution instead of being “as soft as cotton candy,” he said.
Although the government had made tremendous efforts in tackling pollution, he said, progress still fell short of people’s expectations.
The targets for energy conservation and emission reduction have been placed in a more prominent position in this year’s government work report.
The government plans to reduce the energy intensity, or units of energy per unit of GDP, by 3.1 percent in 2015.
It will also cut the intensity of carbon dioxide by at least 3.1 percent, reduce both chemical oxygen demand and ammonia nitrogen emissions by around 2 percent, and reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides by around 3 percent and 5 percent, respectively.
Policies to improve economic structure and fuel quality will also contribute to pollution control, the premier said.
Li said China would upgrade coal-burning power plants to achieve ultra-low emissions and strive for zero growth in the consumption of coal in the nation’s heavily-polluted areas.
China will promote the use of new-energy vehicles, reduce vehicle exhaust emissions, raise the national fuel quality standard, and provide gasoline and diesel of higher quality.
All highly polluted vehicles registered before 2005 will be banned from the road.
“This is a joint effort of the whole society,” Li said. “It may be difficult for one to change the natural environment he lives in anytime soon but one can always change the way he behaves.”
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