In that time, Qian'an environmental protection bureau handled more than 50 cases of excessive pollution or lack of environmental impact evaluation.In April, Qian'an Intermediate People's Court sentenced a factory owner to one year in prison for water pollution. Suspects in two other cases are awaiting trial. All three cases came to the attention of the police through tip-offs from the public.

NGOs in China now have the weapon of litigation in their armory to fight the green fight. Last month, a court in Fujian heard an environmental damage lawsuit filed by two NGOs. It was the first filed by NGOs for environmental damage since the new law took effect.

"The rule of law in environmental protection is our basic goal,"said Zhang Boju, executive director of Friends of Nature, one of the organizations which brought the action. "We should use the legal weapon to protect our green mountains and to clean up our rivers."

With obvious smog in many cities and water pollution everywhere, the public has become hyper-aware of environmental problems and wants to see substantial progress.

Much remains to be done. A water resource official from Ya'an, a major refuge for giant pandas in Sichuan Province, recently complained that he has no legal basis to ask small hydropower stations to allow more water downstream in case of drought.

"Public action is far from enough. Of course citizens should play a bigger part in environmental monitoring, but we must also do more to pollute less and adopt energy-saving ways of life," Zhang said, citing this year's World Environment Day theme - Seven Billion Dreams. One Planet. Consume with Care.

Recycle, re-use

An industrial park is under construction in Ya'an with recycling at its heart. With forest coverage of 63 percent, the highest in Sichuan, Ya'an was made one of 55 ecological demonstration areas last year.

In the recycling park EMIN Microcrystalline Technology produces microcrystalline stone from leftovers from granite production processes. Ya'an has rich granite resources.

"Our production process has zero emissions of carbon dioxide and other waste," said Wang Ganglin, deputy general manager of the company.

Ya'an is moving polluting plants out of key ecological areas and planning a national giant panda park. The government of under-developed Ya'an has made eco-tourism a key strategy for local development while adopting the strictest regulations to protect its water and forests.

Recycling on an industrial scale is being promoted elsewhere in China, including Qian'an, which boasts a provincial-level recycling demonstration park.

China's green future

China is committed to decreasing the share of fossil fuels in primary energy consumption to around 80 percent by 2030 and cutting carbon dioxide emissions 40 to 45 percent from the 2005 level by 2020.

A series of global ecological crises has shown that the Earth is unable to support further industrialization. Developed, capitalist countries suffer from a fundamental conflict between the logic of capital and the natural world, according Zhao Lingyun, an eco-economist and former head of Hubei Academy of Social Sciences.

Zhao said the developed powers have alleviated their own ecological crises by seeking ecological hegemony, exploiting the resources of other countries and transferring their ecological burdens abroad. But socialist China that puts people's interests first has advantages in building a green society, said Zhao.

Chinese President Xi Jinping last week said coordinated regional growth and green development must be carried out fully, and green development will be prominent in the 13th five-year plan (2016-2020) for social and economic development.

In its first report on public awareness of ecological civilization, by the Ministry of Environmental Protection last year, 78 percent of those surveyed agreed it was a matter for everyone and 99.5 percent promised to actively work toward the goal of a society in balance with itself and with nature.