The second round of central ecological environmental protection supervision was finally launched. One of the special features of this round of environmental protection supervision is that the central enterprises were included in the environmental protection supervision object for the first time. The first batch of inspectors were two state-owned enterprises, China Minmetals Group and China Chemical Group.

According to the Ministry of Ecological Environment on July 8, the second round of the first batch of central ecological environmental protection inspectors will be launched in an all-round way recently. The Ministry of Ecology and Environment has set up eight Central ecological environment protection supervision groups, which are responsible for the supervision and stationing of six provinces and municipalities, China Mine Group Co., Ltd. and China Chemical Group Co., Ltd. in two central enterprises. The arrival time is about one month.

The main business of Minmetals Group and Chemical Group are mining industry and chemical industry, which belong to pollution-prone industry. According to the past data, there have been environmental pollution incidents, and they have been named in the last round of environmental protection supervision.

Minmetals was named in the first round of environmental supervision

Minmetals Group is restructured by the former China Mineral and Metallurgical Group. Its core business is metal mining. Its business system covers mineral development, metal materials, metallurgical engineering and so on. In the previous first round of central ecological environmental supervision, Minmetals Group has been named.

From April 24 to May 24, 2017, the Sixth Environmental Protection Supervision Group of the Central Committee carried out environmental protection supervision in Hunan Province, and provided feedback to the Hunan Provincial Party Committee and the provincial government on July 31, 2017.The inspector pointed out that the problems existing in Hunan Province include "not daring or unwilling to manage the environmental problems of large enterprises", where the large enterprises refer to the Minmetals Group. Most of the non-ferrous metal mining and smelting enterprises in Hunan Province are affiliated enterprises of China Minmetals Group. Since 2013, these enterprises have accumulated dozens of environmental violations that have not been investigated and punished according to law, making enterprises "big shopkeepers" pay little attention to their own environmental problems, do not rectify, and long-term violations of laws and regulations.

In addition, the inspection team named two enterprises under the Five Mining Group: Hunan Nonferrous Hengdong Fluorine Chemistry Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Hengdong Fluorine Chemistry") repeatedly secretly discharged industrial wastewater, repeatedly prohibited. When the inspection team on-site, the enterprise's excessive fluorine-containing wastewater was still discharged through rainwater outlets; Hunan Shuikoushan Nonferrous Metals Group was limited. The company (hereinafter referred to as "Shuikoushan Group") has many smelting enterprises with incomplete sewage removal and diversion, serious running and dripping, and wastewater seepage directly pollutes the environment. During the period of supervision, the third, fourth and sixth smelters all have the problem of pollutant discharge exceeding the standard.

On September 28, 2018, Hunan Province released a report on the implementation of the rectification of supervisory feedback. In the course of the rectification, Hunan Province's key inspector and supervisor-run Minmetals Group has made serious efforts to rectify environmental problems in Hunan enterprises, investigating and punishing the environmental violations committed by Minmetals Group in Hunan enterprises and seriously pursuing their responsibilities.

The environmental protection department of Hunan Province has carried out cross-Law enforcement on-site inspections on 27 enterprises affiliated to Minmetals Group in Hunan. A total of 100 environmental violations committed by Minmetals Group in Hunan Province have been investigated and dealt with, with a penalty of 1.27 million yuan, and administrative detention of two persons in charge of Hengdong Fluorine Chemistry. The suspected environmental crime cases in the No.3 Smelter of Shuikoushan Group have been transferred to the public security organs. Hengdong Fluorine Chemistry and Shuikoushan Group also have corresponding fines and administrative penalties, and carried out pollution clearance and diversion, sealing leakage, adding catchment pools and other rectification measures.

Previously, two companies of China Minmetals Group, Hunan Yaogangxian Mining Co., Ltd. and Hunan Shizhuyuan Nonferrous Metals Co., Ltd., had committed environmental violations. In June 2015, the Chenzhou Municipal Government convened a special meeting to study the case filing and investigation of two companies by the Chenzhou Environmental Protection Bureau. In the form of meeting summaries, the Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau was requested not to punish or transfer to the public security organs for the time being. The inspector's opinion points out that this is a violation of regulations to interfere with environmental law enforcement.

After being pointed out by the supervisory group, Chenzhou abolished the agreed matters interfering with environmental law enforcement in the minutes of the two meetings, cancelled the suspension procedure of administrative penalties, continued to punish enterprise illegal acts according to law and regulations, and restarted the handling of administrative penalty cases involving enterprise environmental illegal acts, with a total penalty of 1.42 million yuan.

On December 27, 2018, Hunan Province reported the accountability of the central environmental protection supervision, in which the typical cases reported by the Minmetals Group, said that the local supervision of the enterprises under China Minmetals Group and other companies was weak, and in some places even sheltered connivance. The Chenzhou Municipal Government twice hindered the environmental protection departments from enforcing the administrative law of the enterprises affiliated to China Minmetals Group and China Building Materials Group. Hengyang City, Changning City, Hengdong County Government and environmental protection departments are not able to supervise the environmental violations of enterprises affiliated to China Minmetals Group. Relevant leading cadres were punished.

It is noteworthy that from October 30 to November 30, 2018, the Fourth Central Eco-environmental Protection Supervision Group carried out a "look back" on the first round of central environmental protection supervision and rectification in Hunan Province, with Li Jiaxiang as the head of the supervision group. Li Jiaxiang is also the head of the inspection team stationed in Minmetals Group during this round of environmental protection supervision.

Chemical Industry Group was named in the last round of environmental protection supervision one year after the implementation of EIA approval restriction.China Chemical Group's business sector includes new chemical materials and special chemicals, agricultural chemicals, basic chemicals, rubber tires, petroleum processing, chemical equipment and so on. According to its official website, the group has formulated a strict project exit mechanism, gradually withdrawing high energy consumption and high discharge devices from the production field, actively exploring chemical "zero discharge" technology, and built a number of wastewater "zero discharge" projects in the field of sewage treatment, including Fengshen shares. However, chemical groups and their affiliates have also been notified of environmental problems.

On June 15, 2015, the former Ministry of Environmental Protection issued the Notice on Punishment of Areas and Enterprises with Problems in Emission Reduction. China Chemical Industry Group Co., Ltd. and Shandong Weiqiao Pioneering Group Co., Ltd. failed to put into operation by the end of 2014 due to the key items of the target responsibility letter and reached the required desulfurization efficiency or the desulfurization of their enterprises. The construction of denitrification facilities is generally lagging behind and the problem of excessive emission is prominent. The Ministry of Environmental Protection has suspended the approval of the environmental impact assessment documents for new construction projects with SO2 and NOX emissions.

A year later, until August 3, 2016, the EIA approval of Chemical Industry Group was lifted. The Ministry of Environmental Protection's circular shows that China Chemical Industry Group has taken effective measures to implement the task of rectification and improvement. At present, it has completed the key project of the target responsibility document and the task of pollution control of enterprises that do not meet the standards, basically meeting the requirement of lifting the limit.

Chemical Group subsidiaries have also been named in the last round of environmental supervision. In August 2018, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment found that China Chemical Group Shandong Changyi Petrochemical Co., Ltd. was suspected of illegally producing and selling country IV ordinary diesel oil. However, in further investigation, the enterprise refused to cooperate, did not provide relevant accounts, and temporarily compiled relevant records. From Nov. 1 to Dec. 1, 2018, the Third Central Eco-environmental Protection Supervision Group carried out a "look back" on the first round of central environmental protection supervision and rectification in Shandong Province. The report showed that Shandong Changyi Petrochemical Co., Ltd. refused to cooperate in the on-site inspection and temporarily fabricated false records.

The second round of environmental protection supervision was launched. The Ministry of Ecology and Environment said that for the central enterprises, it will focus on the implementation of the main responsibility of pollution prevention and control; promote the implementation of the key battles of pollution prevention and control; the central ecological environment protection supervision, and other important inspection problems and the rectification and Implementation of the central media exposure problems. The current situation of enterprise's ecological environment protection management and compliance with laws and regulations such as environmental protection law; the handling and solving of historical ecological environment problems; the prevention and control of ecological environment risks and their disposal, as well as the construction and operation of long-term mechanism of ecological environment protection, etc.