To regulate the sewage treatment market requires compliance with rules

On the one hand, some local governments and enterprises have weak legal concepts. Some companies believe that by signing relevant agreements with the government, they can be exempt from legal restrictions or exempt from liability. For example, in the exemption agreement signed between a sewage treatment company in Wuhan and the government, it is stated that “the company does not bear economic responsibility for the excess water quality caused by the excess water quality”. For another example, the agreement signed between Mengzhou Urban Sewage Treatment Co., Ltd. and the Municipal Industrial Cluster Management Committee also has a similar agreement: "During the operation period, if the following influent water quality does not meet the standards, the sewage treatment plant cannot operate normally. Although the project company has tried its best to take measures, the quality of the effluent is still not up to standard. Party B shall not be liable and will not affect the collection of sewage treatment service fees by Party B in accordance with the agreement." However, the current law does not provide for exceptions and exemptions from punishment. Exemption from liability, and the above agreement is only a contractual act and has no binding force on administrative penalties.

On the other hand, some industrial enterprises lack the spirit of contract. Urban sewage treatment should provide public services related to people's livelihood, but some places actually incorporate industrial wastewater into the urban sewage system for treatment. This is one of the key incentives for the overload of influent water and the increase in water pollution. The main reason for the excessive discharge of the total discharge of the urban sewage treatment in Mengzhou is that some industrial enterprises have failed to comply with the contract and caused problems in water intake.

Based on the above analysis, it is not difficult to find that the key to resolving the problem of "non-compliance of water inflow leading to excessive discharge", which restricts the long-term and healthy development of the sewage treatment market, must start with the establishment of a legal concept and abiding by the spirit of contract.

Establish the concept of the rule of law to ensure that the content of the agreement does not violate current laws and regulations. Article 50 of the "Water Pollution Prevention and Control Law" clearly stipulates: "The operating unit of the urban sewage treatment facility shall be responsible for the quality of the effluent of the urban sewage treatment facility." This means that once the urban sewage treatment plant receives sewage, it must Emissions that meet the standards in accordance with the law, even if a liability exemption agreement is signed, cannot escape legal responsibility when the emissions exceed the standards. However, the rights and interests of sewage treatment plants are not without protection. According to the relevant provisions of the "Urban Drainage and Sewage Treatment Regulations", companies can complain to the Housing and Urban-rural Development Commission and require the management to perform their supervisory duties if the inflow exceeds the standard. If you do not act, you can apply for administrative reconsideration or even administrative litigation.

Abide by the spirit of the contract, and guarantee the inflow and quality of the sewage treatment plant. The relationship between sewage treatment plants and industrial enterprises is essentially the relationship between the seller and the buyer of social services under the market economy. Now that the service standards have been agreed, both parties should fulfill their obligations as agreed: Industrial enterprises should try to avoid problems such as overloading of sewage treatment plants' influent water or rising water pollution concentrations; sewage treatment plants should also improve the operation level of treatment facilities, Ensure compliance with emission standards. At the same time, in order to prove their innocence, industrial enterprises and sewage treatment plants should install online monitoring facilities to prove that there is a causal link between excess pollutants at the inlet and excess pollutants at the outlet, and provide evidence support for the implementation of contractual liability clauses.

In addition, the government should also shoulder corresponding responsibilities. The healthy and stable development of the sewage treatment market requires government departments to create a good regulatory atmosphere. The ecological environment and housing construction departments should improve the supervision regulations as soon as possible, clarify the operation of sewage treatment plants and the cooperative supervision of upstream and downstream links, and make up for the shortcomings of the pretreatment link and the pipeline network transportation link. At the same time, the regulatory authorities must also supervise relevant industrial enterprises in accordance with regulations and standards, promptly stop their malicious discharge of pollutants, and ensure the stable operation of sewage treatment plants.

Transfer from: China Environmental Protection Network