中华人民共和国法律法规/水污染防治

Article 1 This Law is enacted for the purposes of preventing and controlling water pollution, protecting and improving the environment, safeguarding human health, ensuring effective utilization of water resources and promoting progress of the socialist modernization drive.

Article 2 This Law applies to prevention and control of pollution of rivers, lakes, canals, irrigation channels, reservoirs and other surface water bodies and of ground water bodies within the territory of the People's Republic of China.

Article 3 Relevant departments under the State Council and local people's governments at various levels must incorporate protection of the water environment into their plans and adopt ways and measures to prevent and control water pollution.

Article 4 The environmental protection departments of the people's governments at various levels shall be the organs exercising unified supervision and management of prevention and control of water pollution.

Navigation administration offices of the communications departments at various levels shall be the organs exercising supervision and management of pollution caused by ships.

Water conservancy administration departments, public health administration departments, geological and mining departments, municipal administration departments, and water sources protection agencies for major rivers of the people's governments at various levels shall, through performing their respective functions and in conjunction with environmental protection departments, exercise supervision over and management of prevention and control of water pollution.

Article 5 All units and individuals shall have the duty to protect the water environment and the right to supervise and inform against any pollution or damage to the water environment.

Any unit or individual that has suffered damage directly from a water pollution hazard shall have the right to demand elimination of the hazard and compensation for the damage by the polluter.

Article 6 The environmental protection department under the State Council shall establish the national standards for water environment quality.

The people's governments of provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government may establish their own local standards for the items that are not specified in the national standards for water environment quality and report the same to the environmental protection department under the State Council for the record.

Article 7 The environmental protection department under the State Council shall, in line with the national standards for water environment quality and the country's economic and technological conditions, establish the national standards for discharge of water pollutants.

The people's governments of provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government may establish their own local standards for the items that are not specified in the national standards for discharge of water pollutants.

With regard to the items that are already specified in the national standards for discharge of water pollutants, they may establish more stringent local standards than the national standards.

All local standards must be reported to the environmental protection department under the State Council for the record.

Article 8 The environmental protection department under the State Council and the people's governments of provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government shall, in line with the requirements of prevention and control of water pollution and the country's economic and technological conditions, amend in due time their standards for water environment quality and for discharge of water pollutants.

Article 9 Relevant departments under the State Council and local people's governments at various levels shall, when developing, utilizing, regulating and allocating water resources, make integrated plans for maintaining proper river flows, proper water levels of lakes, reservoirs and proper ground water tables, in order to retain the natural purification capacity of water bodies.

Plans for preventing and controlling water pollution, once approved, shall serve as the essential basis for prevention and control of water pollution, and any modification of such plans shall be subject to approval of the original departments that approved the plans.

Local people's governments at or above the county level shall, in accordance with the approved plans for preventing and controlling water pollution of river basins, organize people to work out plans for preventing and controlling water pollution for their own administrative regions and incorporate such plans in the long-term, medium-term and annual plans of their administrative regions for national economic and social development.

Article 11 Relevant departments under the State Council and local people's governments at various levels shall make rational plans for the geographical distribution of industries, subject those enterprises that cause water pollution to rectification and technological updating, adopt comprehensive prevention and control measures, increase the rate of water recycling, utilize resources rationally and reduce discharge of waste water and pollutants.

Article 12 The people's governments at or above the county level may delineate protection zones for water bodies in scenic or historic sites, major fishery water bodies and other water bodies of special economic or cultural value, and take measures to ensure that the water quality in those protection zones complies with the standards for the designated uses.

Article 13 New construction projects and expansion or reconstruction projects and other installations on water that directly or indirectly discharge pollutants to water bodies shall be subject to relevant State regulations governing environmental protection for such projects.

The facilities for prevention and control of water pollution must be designed, constructed and put to use or into operation simultaneously with the main part of a construction project.

An environmental impact statement shall contain comments and suggestions of the units and residents in the place where the construction project is located.