In recent days, major environmental incidents have occurred in the country. Since the pollution incident on the Songhua River on November 13, 2005, this year, on February 1st, the State Environmental Protection Administration received 45 reports of various types of environmental incidents. Among the most significant events were the cadmium pollution incident in Beijiang, Guangdong, the excessive phenol concentration in Fushun, Fushun, Liaoning, the water pollution incident in Tianshui, Hongshui River in Guangxi, the cadmium pollution incident in Zhuzhou and Changsha in Hunan, and the diesel in Gongyi Second Power Plant in Henan. Leakage of pollution from the Yellow River incident and pollution from oil tanker accidents in the Minjiang River waters in Jiangxi Province. Many of the above environmental incidents indicate that due to the hidden environmental risks and structural environmental risks of the layout, the high incidence of sudden environmental events in China will continue to exist for some time to come.
The State Council’s recently released “Overall Contingency Plan for Public Emergencies in Public Events†clearly states that brief information should be released to the public at the first time when a public emergency occurs. As the first step in establishing a comprehensive environmental information disclosure system, the State Environmental Protection Administration will first establish an effective information disclosure system for sudden environmental incidents. The first is to standardize the information reporting system and procedures for emergency environmental incidents, the second is to standardize the system and procedures for the notification and information release of environmental incidents, and the third is to establish a accountability mechanism.
On February 6th, the relevant person in charge of the State Environmental Protection Administration notified six recent environmental emergencies and asked local environmental protection agencies to strengthen environmental supervision and establish a public environmental information disclosure system, especially the information disclosure system for emergent environmental events. Maintain the people's right to know the environment.