In p>2115, an "environmental storm" blew up in the mainland of China, and 31 projects under construction with a total investment of over RMB 117.9 billion were stopped by the State Environmental Protection Administration, including three projects of the Three Gorges Corporation, which are all ministerial units. The reason is that these projects have not been assessed by environmental impact, and they are illegal projects that have not been approved for construction.
Environmental deterioration The environmental problems in China, no way back did not start today. As early as the 1991s, the problem of environmental pollution was very serious. Such as the Huaihe River Basin. In the 1991s, five types of water quality accounted for 81%, and the whole Huaihe River was like a huge sewage ditch all the year round. In 1995, the economic losses caused by environmental pollution reached 187.5 billion yuan.
according to the calculation of Chinese academy of sciences, the losses caused by environmental pollution and ecological destruction have already accounted for 15% of the total GDP, which means 9% economic growth on the one hand and 15% loss rate on the other. The environmental problem is not only a problem of China's sustainable development, but also a demon that devours economic achievements.
At present, the desertification land in China has reached more than 2.674 million square kilometers; Cultivated land and homes with a population of nearly 411 million in 471 counties in 18 provinces and autonomous regions of China are threatened by desertification to varying degrees, and desertification is still growing at a rate of more than 1,111 square kilometers per year.
among the seven river systems, the water quality that is completely useless has exceeded 41%. More than 411 of the 668 cities in China are in a state of water shortage. Many of them are caused by water pollution. Ningbo City, Zhejiang Province, for example, is located at the intersection of Yongjiang River, Yaojiang River and Fenghua River. However, due to water pollution, it is necessary to rely on water tankers to run around the clock when it is most short of water to transport water from rural rivers to various enterprises in the city.
The average industrial added value of 1,111 yuan in China requires 331 cubic meters of water consumption and 231 cubic meters of sewage; Every billion yuan of GDP is created, 288,111 tons of wastewater will be discharged. There is also a lot of domestic sewage. More than 81% of them will be directly discharged into rivers without treatment. Otherwise, there will be no water available in China in 2111.
1/3 of the urban population in China breathes seriously polluted air, and 1/3 of the country is eroded by acid rain. In economically developed Zhejiang Province, the acid rain coverage rate has reached 111%. The frequency of acid rain is 11% in Shanghai and about 12% in Jiangsu. In Central China and some southern cities, such as Yibin, Huaihua, Shaoxing, Zunyi, Ningbo and Wenzhou, the frequency of acid rain exceeds 91%.
In China, the maximum allowable sulfur dioxide emission for basically eliminating acid rain pollution is 1.2 million to 1.4 million tons. In 2113, the national sulfur dioxide emissions reached 21.587 million tons, an increase of 12% over 2112, of which industrial emissions increased by 14.7%. At the current rate of economic development. As well as the way and intensity of pollution control, by 2121, the sulfur dioxide emitted by thermal power plants alone in China will reach more than 21 million tons, and the total emission will exceed the atmospheric environmental capacity by more than 1 times, which will be a serious disaster for the ecological environment and people's health.
On October 27th, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, it was predicted that if it was not rectified, the sudden environmental crisis in human history would probably destroy the economic and social system the most in the near future in China.
there is a saying that pollution control is in a dilemma. to control the environment while developing the economy, the investment in environmental protection must reach more than 1.5% of GDP. However, this is under the condition that environmental protection is already very good. In China, according to Shanghai's experience, to really control the environment effectively, the investment in environmental protection must account for more than 3% of GDP. In the past 21 years, China's annual investment in environmental protection was 1.5% in the first half of 1991s, and only a little more than 1% in recent years. Environmental protection is a kind of "luxury consumption", with a large investment and a small contribution to GDP. Therefore, some special funds originally used for environmental protection have also been used for other purposes.
At present, China is in a dilemma on environmental issues: if it is not treated, the future cannot be guaranteed; If we really want to govern, we need large-scale investment, and the immediate economy is unbearable.
It has been calculated that the enterprises around Dianchi Lake in Yunnan have only created several billion yuan of output value in the past 21 years, but it will cost at least several billion yuan to initially restore the water quality of Dianchi Lake, which is the fiscal revenue of Yunnan Province for one year. Small paper mills in the Huaihe River Basin have a cumulative output value of only 51 billion yuan in 21 years. However, to control the pollution caused by it, even if the main stream reaches the minimum irrigation water standard, it needs to invest 311 billion yuan. It will not only cost a terrible number, but also take at least 111 years to restore the three kinds of water quality in the 1971s.
low illegal cost and high law enforcement cost. From a microscopic point of view, in the past 21 years, domestic manufacturing industry can only tap the potential in two aspects: one is wages, and the other is environmental protection. The simplest thing, such as cement production, needs to increase the 8 yuan cost per ton of cement, accounting for 5% of the ex-factory price of cement. The textile industry discharges more than 1 billion cubic meters of wastewater every year. If it is to be treated, it will cost 1.2~1.8 yuan per ton. Increase the production cost by 5%. And most enterprises simply don't have such a high profit rate. Therefore, we can only fight guerrilla warfare on the issue of environmental protection: either we don't build any wastewater treatment facilities, or we can put the sewage into the treatment pool during the day and discharge it into the river at night when no one is around, which can save a lot of money. In the disorderly competition of the market, this 5% cost. It often determines the profit and loss, life and death of the enterprise.
China's two highs and one low in environmental law enforcement-high cost of law-abiding, high cost of law-enforcement and low cost of illegality-also contributed to this tendency. Usually, it costs 511,111 yuan for the environmental protection department to obtain evidence of an illegal smuggling incident, and the fine that eventually falls on the illegal enterprise is only 51,111 yuan, including the so-called "environmental storm" that is blowing hard.
some mega-power station projects that have invested billions of yuan have started construction without authorization in violation of environmental assessment, and the final fine is only 211,111 yuan. A fine of only 211,111 yuan is simply nine Niu Yi cents for a project with an investment of over 111 million yuan. How powerful is such punishment for illegal activities? Therefore, the Environmental Protection Law has always been called the "Tofu Law".
an environmental storm will involve hundreds of thousands of enterprises, which will inevitably lead to the bankruptcy of a large number of enterprises, unemployment of a large number of people, a substantial increase in enterprise costs, and the domestic price index quickly breaking through double digits. Therefore, both macro and micro costs are actually unbearable.
Four factors hinder the huge resistance of environmental governance to the environmental protection department in the process of law enforcement. Pan Yue, deputy director of the State Environmental Protection Administration, summed up four reasons:
First, some places do not know Scientific Outlook on Development well and simply pursue economic growth. Some projects with high energy consumption and heavy pollution, such as small smelting, small ferroalloy and small chemical industry, which are explicitly prohibited, have actually shown a trend of spread in some places.
Secondly, in attracting investment, some local governments unilaterally emphasize the simplification of examination and approval, and handle relevant procedures within a time limit. No matter whether the project will be polluted or not, it will be approved as long as it is invested. In some places, there are illegal phenomena such as "the will of the head" and "getting on the bus first and buying tickets later" in the environmental impact approval of construction projects.
Thirdly, the quality of EIA needs to be improved. Some EIA units do not insist on scientific evaluation, dare not speak with objective facts and scientific data, and their evaluation conclusions are vague and ambiguous. They push the conclusion of the environmental feasibility of the project to the examination and approval department, and even a few EIA units resort to fraud, fabricate or falsify data, or conceal facts, which seriously affects the implementation of the environmental impact assessment system, making environmental impact assessment a mere formality and losing the minimum scientific and fair nature of third-party consulting institutions.
finally, information disclosure and public participation are not carried out sufficiently. China's current environmental impact assessment system is government-led, and it is obviously not enough to supervise a large number of construction projects with limited government power.
in fact, the resistance encountered by EIA method is driven by the economic interests behind it.
Set off a real "environmental storm"
China is a big country with little room for manoeuvre in the environment, and a rising country after the global resources and markets have been basically divided up. There is no possibility for China to wait until the environment is extremely bad, like some pioneering countries.
But China is also a developing country, and China will inevitably take the road of developing economy first and then controlling pollution.
the history of all countries in the world has shown that there is a * * * same law between economic growth and environmental change: in the process of industrialization, a country will have a period of rapid growth of environmental pollution with GDP, especially in the era of heavy chemical industry; but when GDP grows to a certain extent, with the upgrading of industrial structure and the enhancement of residents' willingness to pay for the environment. After reaching the turning point, the pollution level will suddenly decline with the growth of GDP until the pollution level returns to below the environmental capacity, which is the so-called environmental Kuznets curve, and the development process of Japan in that year was this law.
there is no doubt that it is impossible for China to leapfrog such an era of heavy chemical industry. Because China's population is too large and the country is too big, it can't directly enter the high-tech era with the help of the global division of labor, like Finland, when its manufacturing industry is underdeveloped.
in the late 1991s, the author went back to his hometown in southern Jiangsu. The scene when I was a child, when I was clear of the river, I could reach eight towns in four townships by boat is gone forever. To my surprise, the main factor causing this situation is the most common domestic garbage. In China, even if the industry is not developed, the pollutants brought by population growth are enough to make the environment worse to an intolerable level. Even to control such pollution, it needs a large investment and an economic foundation.
China has a long way to go in pollution control. It needs to act according to law to stop the occurrence of vicious environmental incidents and slow down the pace of environmental deterioration.
what kind of environmental protection concept should we hold
what kind of ecological environmental protection concept and resource development concept should we hold? Are environmental protection and resource development an irreconcilable contradiction? I think not. Because their goals are the same, they are all for the survival of mankind. Therefore, scientific eco-environmental protection and resource development can achieve unity of opposites.
I believe that all people who care about environmental issues have a sincere heart for our future generations to survive better. We should not doubt those who exploit natural resources in order to make people in poverty-stricken areas get rid of poverty and get rich as soon as possible. They also have a boxing heart to ensure and improve the survival of people in poverty-stricken areas. Only those who strongly advocate protection consider the long-term survival of the whole mankind, while those who actively advocate development want to solve the survival problem of people in local areas at present. Do we have any reason to deprive local people of their right to survival and development?
In recent years, with the propaganda efforts of environmental protection organizations, the general public has already got a certain environmental awareness, which is the credit of environmental protection organizations and people, but having environmental awareness does not mean knowing environmental protection. There are still many of us who are aware of environmental protection, but out of consideration for their immediate interests and greed for enjoyment, they are unwilling to consciously abide by environmental protection standards. For example, some of us who don't have to worry about our food and clothing have promoted and stimulated the emergence and development of the wildlife trading market in order to taste the game, wear high-grade fur fashion and show off our wealth, which has made our exploitation and utilization of natural resources beyond the capacity of nature. In this process, the consumers who really should be blamed are those who have no worries about food and clothing, not those who have no food and clothing and have to ask for natural resources in order to survive, nor should they be blamed for developing and utilizing natural resources in order to get people in poverty-stricken areas out of trouble as soon as possible.
why did the environmental problem not attract people's attention at least before the industrial revolution, but now it has become a global urgent problem that is increasingly affecting human survival? This is because in the past, human's demand for natural resources and all kinds of garbage produced have not exceeded the tolerance of nature, but now, human's over-exploitation and utilization of nature and a large number of domestic and industrial garbage have exceeded the tolerance of nature. How did this happen? It is the constant pursuit of material and spiritual enjoyment after solving the problem of food and clothing. To completely solve the environmental problems, we must curb people's ever-expanding desire for pleasure. Therefore, when we publicize environmental protection and expose environmental problems, the most important thing is to advocate a moral concept of helping the poor for the rich and lead a simple life among us urbanites who have no worries about food and clothing and enjoy a modern civilized life. Those who live in poor and backward areas, their lives are backward and simple enough, and they have become so simple that it is difficult to make a living. How to solve their survival and development problems?
We should oppose that dogmatic and extreme idea of environmental protection. On the surface, this kind of thinking seems correct and extremely confusing, but in fact it is very selfish and irresponsible, because they deprive people in poor and backward areas of their right to survival and development.
In remote poor and backward areas, local people hunt, cut down trees and burn wasteland for survival. It is precisely because the dawn of modern civilization has not yet reached them that they still follow this backward way of life. Under such living conditions, what do you want them to eat without hunting and cutting down trees? Burn what? With what? Some of our environmentalists always indiscriminately criticize the development and utilization of natural resources by local governments and local residents in these areas, and often make a well-meaning mistake, that is, you can't cut down the virgin forests here, kill wild animals, build dams on the rivers here, and preserve the original features here. You can promote economic development by developing green tourism. But at present, our national quality and environmental awareness are not high, is tourism really green? Will developing tourism not cause damage to the ecological environment? Let's see what happens. 1. In the past, local people only produced a small amount of domestic garbage, and there was almost no non-degradable garbage; Now, due to the influx of a large number of tourists, it brings a lot of domestic garbage, especially those plastic food packaging bags that were rarely seen in the past; Whose fault is this? 2. Because tourists want to taste the local game, the original nonexistent wildlife trade came into being; In the past, local people only hunted and dug wild animals and plants in small quantities to satisfy their own consumption; Now, in order to meet the needs of tourists and increase their economic income, they begin to kill and dig wild animals and plants in large numbers; Whose fault is this? 3. In the past, local people were simple and sincere; Now, with all kinds of tourists, all kinds of bizarre off-mountain cultures, all kinds of fake and shoddy goods and colorful cheat people brought by illegal traders, the local people have benefited a lot from deceptive means, and the folk customs are no longer simple and sincere; Whose fault is this?
The Lugu Lake scenic spot in Yunnan is such a living example, which was reported by CCTV. However, this report simply accuses the relevant local government departments.