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June 2, 2017

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Home » Metro » Environment

Tougher fines for polluting rivers

THE maximum fine for illegally discharging sewage into local rivers has been raised fivefold to 500,000 yuan (US$73,470) for a first violation.

Shanghai Water Authority also announced yesterday that the fine would be increased if polluters didn’t take action to remedy the damage caused.

The new punishment standards on waste water discharge have been issued by the authority in response to a report issued by the central government’s environment inspection team in April. In the report, the inspection team pointed out problems in Shanghai’s efforts to build a better ecological environment, including the local government’s “leniency” toward environmental management.

The previous regulation stipulated the punishment against unlicensed sewage discharging was a maximum of 100,000 yuan.

The new standard has not only significantly increased the fines, but also warns polluters may face criminal charges.

Jifu, a local real estate developer, has become the first firm to be punished under the more severe standard.

The company discharged waste water into the city’s sewage pipeline system without permission and would receive a 500,000 yuan fine, the water authority said yesterday.

The authority said it had sent law enforcement teams to monitor more than 10,000 construction sites across the city. They had detected 246 cases of violations of sewage discharge and had issued fines totaling 6.6 million yuan from January to April.

A construction site in Putuo’s Taopu area, for instance, was fined 450,000 yuan in February for discharging waste water from the site to the city’s rainwater pipelines.

Another construction site in the Hongqiao area received two fines, totaling 620,000 yuan, also for illegally discharging sewage into rain pipes.




 

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