China prepares to handle environmental emergencies including terrorist attacks: white paper

    The Chinese government enacted the State Plan for Handling Environmental Emergencies in 2005, said a white paper entitled Environmental Protection in China (1996-2005).

    The emergencies include terrorist attacks involving chemical weapons, and terrorist attacks involving nuclear and radioactive materials, according to the white paper released by the Information Office of the State Council on Monday.

    The white paper said the plan set forth clear requirements on how to receive, report, handle, compute and analyze information concerning environmental emergencies, as well as how to monitor and release early-warning information.

    The State has formulated and improved nine plans for environment emergencies. Among them are plans for handling water environment emergencies in sensitive water areas in key river valleys, plans for handling atmospheric environment emergencies, plans for handling dangerous chemicals (discarded chemicals) emergencies, and plans for handling nuclear and radioactive matter emergencies.

    In addition, it has worked out the Plan for Handling Water Environment Emergencies in Sensitive Sections of the Yellow River Valley, Plan for Handling Terrorist Attacks Involving Chemical Weapons, Plan for Handling Terrorist Attacks Involving Nuclear and Radioactive Materials, Plan for Handling Agriculture-related Environmental Pollution Emergencies, and Plan for Handling Emergencies Involving Major Harmful Agricultural Organisms or Intrusion of Foreign Organisms, said the white paper.

    In recent years, China has evaluated the potential risks of 127key chemical and petrochemical projects located near such environmentally-sensitive areas as the shores of rivers, lakes, oceans, densely-populated regions and nature reserves, conducting comprehensive and careful examinations on nearly 50,000 leading enterprises, said the white paper.

    In 2003, the State put into practice the Plan for the Construction of Facilities for the Treatment of Dangerous Wastes and Medical Wastes. Systems such as those requiring the use of duplicate receipts and operation licenses in transferring dangerous industrial wastes have been reinforced. The amount of treated dangerous industrial wastes in 2005 was 3.39 million tons, as compared with 1.31 million tons in 1998. Thirty-one provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government have established management centers for solid wastes, said the white paper.

    China has five nuclear power plants (nine nuclear power generating units) and 18 nuclear reactors in operation. Two nuclear power plants (four nuclear power generating units) and one nuclear reactor are under construction. No major nuclear security problems have ever occurred in China.

    It has achieved the goal of "protecting the staff, the public and the environment from being exposed to larger amounts of radiation and pollution than permitted by the State", the white paper says.

    China strictly follows the Code of Conduct on the Safety and Security of Radioactive Sources issued by the International Atomic Energy Agency. It has adopted the licensing system, requiring that the import and export of all radioactive sources go through the formalities of examination and approval according to law, said the white paper.

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