Pollution assessments criticised after China says it met all targets

BEIJING — Sceptics rolled their eyes after the Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection announced in July that every province, municipality and autonomous region, as well as eight state-owned conglomerates, had met all government-set targets for cutting air and water pollution last year.

Fuelling the scepticism were long-held doubts about how data is collected and pollution-fighting progress assessed in China — doubts that some industry and government officials say are not only valid but ought to spur change.

The ministry announcement reflected a compilation of upbeat reports filed by dozens of regional governments and state companies, including the country’s best-known petrochemical polluters, PetroChina and Sinopec.

All goals were reached for cutting factory and power plant emissions of four major pollutants in 2014, which was the fourth year of a five-year pollution-fighting programme that began in 2011, the ministry said. These accomplishments suggest that the nation as a whole had reduced airborne sulphur dioxide emissions by 12.9 per cent from the 2010 levels by the end of 2014. Ammoniacal nitrogen and nitrogen oxide levels also met government targets by falling 9.8 per cent and 8.6 per cent respectively. And chemical oxygen demand, a measure of organic compounds in water, have been cut 10.1 per cent.

Meanwhile, sceptics have been urging a closer look at the wide gap between what the public sees and what the data says. Indeed, public perception has led to persistent questions about the government’s methods for measuring pollution levels and assessing the progress of emissions-control initiatives.

Among those posing questions is Mr Wang Zhixuan, secretary-general of the China Electricity Council, a government-backed power industry association. He said the government’s assessment method over-emphasises the role of the electric power industry, for example, while under-emphasising the effects that many small polluters have on the environment.

What is needed in China is a better way to assess pollution-fighting progress based on relevant statistics, Mr Wang said. “When evaluating a person’s weight-loss achievements, you don’t make a judgment based on how much food was not eaten, but on how much weight the person lost.”

MANIPULATED DATA

Environmental regulators have apparently heard Mr Wang and the sceptics and have responded by adjusting their statistical methodology. People close to the environmental industry told Caixin Media Company that elements of the government’s pending emissions reduction plan for 2016 to 2020 — the next five-year plan period — reflect an official interest in relevant changes. For example, the sources said, new rules for emissions volume management will likely be more sophisticated than those currently in place.

In addition, the sources said, the next five-year plan is expected to expand the number of pollutants for which emissions-cutting targets will be set. Nevertheless, the government will probably continue to face questions about the reliability of environment-related statistics.

One reason is that China’s environment is so polluted that improvements may be hard to perceive, Mr Zhai Qing, a Deputy Environmental Protection Minister said in February. Only after emissions are cut some “30 per cent to 50 per cent” will the public be able to notice “significant changes in environmental quality”, he noted.

The emissions level assessment system, in place since 2006, focuses on monitoring the total volumes of selected pollutants discharged into the air and water. Data collected through the system is used by the central government for job performance evaluations of local officials and state-owned enterprise executives.

Many environmental experts have called on China to enforce emissions standards with more vigour. Stricter enforcement, they argue, would be more effective than setting goals for, and tracking, emissions volumes.

Mr Wang said the government’s emphasis on assessments has pushed enforcement of industrial standards into the shadows. Such standards are designed to link environmental quality goals to how cleaner air and water impacts an economy, and a company or region’s technical capabilities.

“If every company meets the standards, but the quality of the environment is still substandard, then emission volume controls should be imposed,” he added. “This would be more reasonable.”

Of course, said Mr Wang, at times emissions assessment data has pointed to problems that force regional government officials and company executives to clean up their act.

But a former ministry official, who requested anonymity, noted that companies need not lift a finger before the final two years of a five-year plan. Even if all emissions cuts are made towards the end of an assessment period, a company can pass inspection. Indeed, the former official said, that is exactly how many companies approach environmental rules. “It’s become a regular pattern,” he said. “The data is totally manipulated.”

RELIABILITY QUESTIONS

Local government and state company officials never disagree with the emission reduction quotas set by the ministry, in part because final assessments can be delayed until the end of the five-year period. Moreover, oversight of the polluters is limited to occasional spot checks on site.

In 2007, the ministry adjusted the statistical basis for its chemical oxygen demand reduction targets after pollution statistics that year were found to be wildly out of line with statistics gleaned from older records.

But the adjustment may have actually made accurate data-gathering more difficult, said Mr Wang Jinnan, vice-president of the ministry’s Chinese Academy for Environmental Planning. Data adjustments, particularly if done frequently, can complicate the task of tracking changes in emission discharge levels, he said.

Without accurate base data, “how can we make sure of the total reduction in emissions?” asked Mr Yang Zhaofei, a former chief engineer at the environmental ministry. Besides, he said, political goals have been the main factors motivating officials and company executives to work to meet emissions quotas.

Base numbers “for emissions assessments came from historical statistics”, said an analyst who did not want to be named. “But the figures did not come from a general survey. They were calculated on the basis of sampling performed by companies.” And this sampling was also unreliable.

In addition, some experts say targets for the current five-year period were set too low. Mr Wang said 2011 to 2015 targets let the power industry discharge 8 million tonnes of sulphur dioxide and 7.5 million tonnes of nitrogen oxides a year. But that is already far above the industry’s own annual standards of 3.67 million and 1.82 million tonnes respectively.

The assessment system is also limited to a few major industries. Between 2005 and 2010, the power industry’s plants were responsible for 60 per cent of the quota for national sulphur dioxide emissions. But other industries, such as agriculture, were not included in the quotas.

What is needed now, Mr Wang said, are changes that help improve environmental oversight, as well as the environment. CAIXIN ONLINE