Zhejiang Province Issues Environmental Permissions for Three Industrial Sectors     

The Zhejiang Provincial Environmental Protection Bureau (ZEPB) has recently issued guiding regulations of environmental permissions for the chemical active pharmaceutical ingredients (API), papermaking from waste paper and dyeing/printing sectors in the province. These three sectors hold a decisive position in the industrial economy of the province.

Chemical API sector: standardize site selection    

The chemical API production in Zhejiang province is mainly concentrated in Hangzhou, Taizhou, Shaoxing and Jinhua. With urban expansion, some pharmaceutical producers in suburbs are included in downtown areas. Some chemical API producers are located upstream of important rivers and even upstream of urban water intakes. Some of them are in inland areas with insufficient environmental volume.
   The regulation issued by ZEPB requests that the site selection of new, renovated and expanded chemical API projects should be in line with industrial development programs and ecological functioning programs, otherwise such projects are not allowed to be launched. Industrial parks should keep a considerable distance away from residential areas.

Papermaking from waste paper sector: lay emphasis on production scale    

Eighty percent of raw materials for papermaking in Zhejiang are waste paper. The regulation has therefore defined the minimum initial single-line scale of new and expanded papermaking projects: 300 000 t/a for newsprint, 100 000 t/a for writing paper, 300 000 t/a for kraft and white paperboard and 100 000 t/a for other paperboards.
   Besides production scale, site selection and papermaking equipment, the regulation has also laid down rigid provisions on indexes for resource utilization such as energy consumption per-unit product, water recycle utilization and comprehensive utilization of sludge, and indexes for pollutant emission such as waste water emission per-unit product and COD emission in the waste paper papermaking sector. What should be noted is that China has implemented special water pollutant emission limit to the papermaking enterprises located in the region surrounding Taihu Lake. Some areas of Zhejiang belong to this region and Zhejiang has extended this special water pollutant emission limit to the whole province.

Dyeing/printing sector: highlight process technology    

The regulation clearly points out that dyeing/printing projects should use advanced technology and energy conservation/environmental protection equipment. The overall level should approach or reach the world advanced level. Outdated production processes and equipment that should be restricted or eliminated upon the related national regulation are forbidden for use.
   The recycling rate of reclaimed water regulated by the central government for the dyeing/printing sector is 30%. The recycling rate of reclaimed water designed in this regulation for dyeing/printing sector such as chemical fibers is 50%.