On September 18, 2019, the Chinese Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) issued a notice [1] to solicit information concerning six persistent organic pollutants (POPs), including short-chained chlorinated paraffins (SCCPs); decabromobiphenyl ether (DecaBDE); polychlorinated naphthalenes (PCN); hexachlorobutadiene (HCBD); pentachlorophenol (PCP) and its salts and esters; and pentadecafluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), its salts and PFOA-related compounds.
Previously, the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants [2] and its Conference of the Parties decided to exercise prohibitive or restrictive measures against the six POPs. For the time being, the decision has not come into force in China.
After the arrangements are put in place in China in the future, the aforementioned substances other than HCBD will be prohibited from production, use, import or export (except for specific exempted purposes). Their wastes should be disposed of with their POP properties eliminated. The disposal process shall not result in recycling, regeneration, direct reuse, etc. of POPs. Notably, HCBD will be completely prohibited from production, use, import or export. The Convention also requires measures be taken to reduce or eliminate unintentional releases of HCBD and PCN.
Thus, in a bid to gain a comprehensive understanding of the six POPs and inform the implementation of the decision, the MEE wants to solicit information on the following four aspects:
Information concerning the production and use of six POPs (production volume, use volume, usage, etc.)
Feasibility of immediately discontinuing their use for purposes other than specific exempted ones
Feasibility of discontinuing their use for specific exempted purposes in five years
Feasibility of release control
Individuals or entities can submit relevant information in writing or via email to the MEE before October 31, 2019.