China's top environmental watchdog yesterday permanently halted
a dozen construction projects that had repeatedly failed to live up
to environmental protection standards.
The 12 projects, representing an investment of about 2 billion
yuan (US$250 million), were located throughout the country. All of
the projects involved heavy-polluting and energy-consuming
facilities, such as iron and steel, metallurgy, refineries and
coking.
Despite repeated warnings from the State Environmental
Protection Administration (SEPA), the projects' developers failed
to take into consideration the pollution they had released and
would release in the future.
"The construction projects, which seriously violated the rules
and requirements on environmental protection, had to be stopped
forever," said Pan Yue, deputy minister of SEPA.
Including yesterday's cancellations, SEPA has recently suspended
more than 80 construction projects, as well as four cities' rights
to approve new projects.
Meanwhile, Laiwu, in east China's Shandong Province, recovered its approval
rights in recognition of its quick and active response to SEPA's
warnings.
(China Daily February 14, 2007)
