(Promulgated by the National Environmental Protection Agency on June, 1990)
In accordance with the stipulation of "The Environmental Protection Law of the People's Republic of China" and "The Measurs on Environmental Protection of Construction Projects", all of the construction projects involved in industry, energy sources, transportation, airports, water conservancy, forestry, commerce, sanitation, culture and education, scientific research, tourism, municipal utilities etc. in the territory of the People's Republic of China, the project undertaken organizations as well as relevant authorities must exercise their responsibilities on the work of environmental protection and go through formalities for examination and approval in accordance with here under-listed procedures, in the course from the project proposal to the project completion and operation .
I. The construction projects refer to any capital construction projects, technical renovation projects and regional development and construction projects including foreign involved projects (Sino-foreign equity joint ventures, Sino-foreign cooperative ventures and wholly foreign owned enterprises).
II. The National Environmental Protection Agency of China (NEPA) is responsible for examining and approving Environmental Impact Statement (Form) (EIS(EIF)) of construction projects here under-listed:
1. The construction projects located transregionally across provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government;
2. The construction projects with special characteristics (eg. nuclear facilities and top secret projects);
3. Super-sized projects (submitted for examination and approval by the State Council), i.e. the construction projects with total investment norm over 200 million yuan, approved by the State Planning Commission or its project assignment submitted by the State Planning Commission to the State Council for approval.
4. The construction projects with argument over environmental impact submitted by environmental protection departments at provincial level.
III. Environmental management and its procedures for construction projects in five major phases
i. Environmental management in the phase of the project proposal and of pre-feasibility study.
1. In conjunction with site selection, the project undertaken organizations make a brief explanation about potentially resulting environmental impacts after the completion and operation of the construction projects (or Initial Environmental Impact Analysis);
2. Participation for environmental protection departments in on-site survey of site selection;
3. Suggestions signed by environmental protection departments at provincial level are brought into the project proposal as a basis for project identification.
ii. Environmental management in the phase of feasibility study (project assignment)
1. NEPA as well as the competent authorities of their lines urge the project undertaken organizations to implement EIS(EIF) examination system in accordance with the approval of project identification by the State Planning Commission as well as the authorities concerned;
2. The project undertaken organizations solicit comments from NEPA and decide to draft EIS or EIF and entrust the organizations held class A assessment certificates to formulate EIF or EIA outlines (implementation programme for EIA);
3. The project undertaken organizations submit the EIA outlines (implementation programme for EIA) to NEPA and send a duplicate to the competent authorities of their lines, along with project identification documents and cost estimate of EIA, NEPA decides examination patterns(organizing experts appraisal meeting, expert on the-spot inspection, and soliciting comments from the authorities concerned), and raises comments of examination;
4. In accordance with the requirements and comments for the outline examination given by NEPA (mainly including the scope of assessment, the criteria selected, established protection objectives, acceptance and rejection of environmental elements, and the cost for EIA etc.) and established content of the outlines, the organizations responsible for assessment sign contracts with project undertaken organizations, implement the work of assessment and formulate EIS.
5. If major alternations in construction projects occur, project undertaken organizations as well as organizations responsible for assessment should report them to the departments responsible for environmental protection immediately;
6. The project undertaken organizations submit the formulated "EIS (EIF)" to the environmental protection agencies of the competent authorities in accordance with the right to examining and approving, and meanwhile send a duplicate to NEPA and environmental protection departments at the location of a project at regional, provincial and municipal levels respectively;
7. The competent authorities organize the pre-examination on EIS (EIF), submit comments of pre-examination and two copies of revised EIS to NEPA for examination and approval. Meanwhile, environmental protection departments at provincial level should send their comments of examination to NEPA. NEPA gives an official, written reply and signs its comments within 2 months of the date on which the comments of pre-examination are received, if no response within this specific time limit, comments of pre-examination and revised EIS will be considered to have been approved.
8. NEPA could entrust the examination of the outlines and the examination and approval of EIS to environmental protection departments at provincial level.
9. NEPA participates in evaluation on feasibility study report of the projects which will exert serious impact on environment.
iii. Environmental management in the design phase
The implementation of the ordinary construction project's design is divided into two phases, ie. preliminary design and working drawing design. For the projects technically complicated and being lack of design experience, under assignment of the competent authorities, the additional phase of technical design could be included; for some lines, master plan and general design could be incorperated in order to solve the major problems of general development programme and construction layout etc.
(i) Environmental management in the phase of preliminary design
1. In preliminary design of the construction projects, chapters on environmental protection must be formulated in accordance with "Regulations for Engineering design on Environmental Protection of Construction Projects (REDEPCP)", the various items of environmental protection measures and their estimated investments defined in the comments of EIS (EIF) by examination and approval should be embodied in these chapters;
2. The project undertaken organizations submit design documents to environmental protection departments at governmental level prior to a joint checkup on design;
3. Super-sized (major) construction projects are examined by NEPA or by the Agency entrusting environmental protection departments at provincial government level to participate in a joint checkup for their design, in accordance with the right to examining; environmental protection departments at provincial government level participates in a joint checkup on design for ordinary construction projects, environmental protection departments could examine chapters on environmental protection separately when necessary ;
(ii) Environmental management in the phase of construction plan design
1. According to the comments of examination and approval from preliminary design examination, the project undertaken organizations in association with the organizations for design implement the design of relevant environmental protection projects and its environmental protection investment;
2. Environmental protection departments organize supervision and examination;
3.The project undertaken organizations submit start-up report of construction for approval, after its approval the construction project is incorporated into the annual plan, of which relevant environmental protection investment should be included.
IV. Environmental management in construction phase
1.The project undertaken organizations in association with the organizations for construction should well accomplish document and information sorting, and record establishing work for construction of environmental protection facilities and fund use for future reference. The progress in construction of environmental protection is submitted to environmental protection departments at governmental level in form of a quarterly;
2.Environmental protection departments check up whether the procedures for submission and approval of environmental protection projects and their funds are incorporated into construction programme or not, and the give then comments.
3.Both the project undertaken organizations and organizations for construction are in charge of implementing environmental protection requirements given by environmental protection departments for construction phase, and environmental protection measures n the course of construction; mainly protecting environment surrounding construction sites to prevent natural environment from hazards which should not occur, avoiding and alleviating the pollution and hazards from dust, noise and vibration to surrounding residential zone; After completion of construction projects, the organizations for construction should improve and recover and recover the environment damaged in the course of construction .
V. Environmental management in the phase of trial operation, completion and acceptance
1.The project undertaken organizations submit applications for trial operation to the competent authorities and environmental protection departments at governmental level;
2.After its approval, environmental protection project in trial operation and principal part of a project put into trial operation simultaneously; record on trial operation should be made, and monitoring should be carried out by local monitoring agencies for environmental protection;
3.The project undertaken organizations submit applications for preacceptance of environmental protection to the competent authorities of their lines and environmental protection departments at governmental level, along with a report on trial operation monitoring;
4.environmental protection departments at provincial government level organize pre-acceptance for environmental protection projects;
5.The project undertaken organizations organize implementation seriously in compliance with the requirements for pre-acceptance given by environmental protection departments, if pre-acceptance is qualified, then official completion and acceptance can be carried out;
6.For super-sized (major) construction projects, NEPA participates in or entrusts environmental protection departments at provincial level to participate in official completion and acceptance, and go through Certificate of Acceptance for Environmental Protection Engineering of Construction Project (AEPECP).
IV. Management for foreign involved projects
For the management of the foreign involved projects, the relevant regulations by the State Council on strengthening the environmental management for the economic zone opened up to the outside world should be implemented, except for going through the relevant formalities for examination and approval according to the procedures aforementioned. Responsibilities and obligations of the interested parties on environmental protection should be definitely specified while a contract is signed," The Three at the Same Time"system should be carried out, control measures should be put into effect, no content violating the national and local environmental protection laws and codes shall be contained in a contract .
