Beijings autoriteter har per 1. marts igangsat nye tiltag, der skal nedbringe smogproblemerne i millionbyen. Manglende evne til at forbedre luftkvaliteteten hidtil har skabt stigende frustration blandt befolkningen.
RTCC, FREDAG D. 28. FEBRUAR 2014 – Companies responsible for Beijing’s heavy air pollution will face harsher punishment as from 1 March, including unlimited fines for repeat offenders.
Beijing’s new Air Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations will mean stricter punishments for those who break the rules designed to quash the hazardous levels of pollution that have beset China’s capital city.
Høje bøder skal afholde virksomheder fra at forurene
Under these new rules, polluting companies that refuse to reduce or suspend their production during bouts of severe pollution will be fined up to 500,000 yuan (US$ 80,000), up from 100,000 yuan, state media reports. Punishments will increase for repeat offenders, with no cap on the amount that they can be fined.
Zhong Chonglei, an official at the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau, said: “The new regulations increase the fines for industrial violators to up to 500-thousand yuan. Companies found breaking the law again and again will be punished even more.
“The new rules also include compulsory measures which will allow authorities to terminate illegal activities immediately, including illegal emissions.”
Et tykt tæppe af smog
The new regulation kicks in as Beijing starts to recover its health from the thick blanket of smog that has choked the city and its residents for almost a week, leading authorities to issue its first ever “orange” warning, signalling a serious health crisis.
In Beijing, and in other cities across China, air quality has worsened over the past decade as the government pursues a model of “growth at all costs”. China currently produces almost half the world’s total volume of coal, according to the IEA.
Tiltagende frustration blandt befolkningen
Anger at the government for their failure to curb the problem has reached fever pitch over the past week, as Beijing residents struggled in a smog that was literally “off the chart” bad.
State media, normally reserved in its criticism of the government, has spoken out against their failure to curb the air pollution.
Writing today in state owned China Daily, deputy editor Chen Weihua complained that, while officials are arrested for “corruption and sex scandals”, no one has so far lost their job for allowing the rampant pollution that is consuming China’s cities.
“So far, which companies had to declare bankruptcy due to the heavy penalties imposed for the serious pollution they caused? How many business owners were put behind bars for the damage they inflicted on the environment?” he writes.
“The laws may have been there for years or decades, yet they are not strictly enforced, or not enforced at all. In fact, such lax enforcement has invited more rampant violations in the past decades.”
– See more at: http://www.rtcc.org/2014/02/28/beijing-polluters-to-face-unlimited-fines-under-new-regulations/#sthash.DSnkencs.dpuf
