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As
part of its efforts to improve compliance, China has been trying
to make greater use of its court system to prosecute polluters,
introducing new legislation, tougher punishments and
environmental circuit courts to deal with rising case loads.
The Environmental Protection Department of Jiangsu said in a
notice on its website that the Anhui Haide Chemical Technology
Corporation was ordered by a court to pay a 55.1 million yuan
($8 million) fine on Monday for illegally disposing hazardous
chemical waste.
In 2014, one of Haide's sales officials entrusted two
individuals to dispose of 102 tonnes of waste lye. The two did
not possess the required disposal permits and dumped the waste
directly into the river, the notice said.
The action polluted the river and forced authorities to cut off
drinking water supplies in the city of Xinghua for more than 50
hours, the notice said.
While the two men were apprehended and given jail sentences,
Jiangsu had to wait until new environmental compensation
guidelines were introduced at the start of this year to take
action against the company itself, it said.
The provincial government originally asked the court to impose
damages of 37 million yuan, but the sum was deemed insufficient
to cover the clean-up costs, the notice said.
This was the first time the new environmental compensation
guidelines had been used by a local government to take legal
action against polluters, it said.
Phone calls to Anhui Haide went unanswered.
(Reporting by David Stanway; Editing by Tom Hogue)
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