Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region Guyuan Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau: Protect the green waters and green mountains of Guyuan at every turn

Travel through the towering Liupan Mountains to the northwest edge of the Loess Plateau, NingxiaHuiThe city of Guyuan in the autonomous region is located here. The mountains and ravines are deep and the soil is poor, in this place of "relying on the sky to eat", there is a team that relies on its own hands to fight on the front line of environmental protection, focusing on the main responsibility and main business of pollution prevention and control, implementing the key points of environmental protection supervision and rectification, and exploring a new model of modern environmental governance...... With practical actions to protect the lucid waters and green mountains of Guyuan, not long ago won the title of advanced collective of the national ecological environment system. They are NingxiaHuiGuyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment of the Autonomous Region (hereinafter referred to as Guyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment)

NingxiaHuiGuyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment, Autonomous Region

Pay close attention to the improvement of the ecological environment and do "surgery" for the Chongqing River

The Yu River flows into Gansu Province through Guyuan City, and finally joins the Wei River, which is a tertiary tributary of the Yellow River.

However, due to the untreated discharge of domestic sewage and industrial sewage into the river, illegal sand mining in the river, the water pollution, soil erosion, and the deterioration of the ecological environment caused the local people to suffer, affecting the production and life of residents in some cities and counties in Gansu Province downstream, which is the focus of the rectification of the central ecological and environmental protection inspection.

Healing the Yu River is not an easy task. Zhao Kexiang, deputy director of the Guyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment, told reporters that Guyuan is a water-scarce city, with small river runoff, and was seriously polluted by problems such as illegal excavation and indiscriminate mining of river beaches, garbage piles, and sewage discharge in the early stage. "To do a good job in the governance of the Chongqing River, we must run through from the source to the end, and we cannot treat the symptoms without treating the root cause. Through communication with relevant departments and experts, we finally formulated three 'operational' plans for the water bodies in the Chongqing River Basin: source control and sewage interception, dredging and dredging, ecological restoration, and river reservoir co-treatment. ”

If the foundation is poor, you have to work "stupid work". As the leader of the three surgeries, Wang Jianping, director of the Longde Branch of the Guyuan Ecological Environment Bureau, recalled that in order to do a "comprehensive physical examination" for the Yu River, he needed to do a lot of data collection and analysis every day, and gradually conducted field investigations along the bank of the Yu River with his colleagues.

According to the actual investigation and the idea of source treatment, 27 direct discharge outlets along the Chongqing River have been blocked, 13 potato starch processing polluting enterprises, 5 illegal sand quarries in the river, 9 clay brick factories have been shut down, 3 township sewage treatment stations along the new second sewage treatment plant have been built, 4,245 water flushing sanitary toilets have been rebuilt for farmers, and 43 kilometers of supporting sewage pipe networks have been closed, and domestic sewage along the line has been effectively treated.

In addition to "hard work", water control should also use "ingenuity". In view of the fragile local ecological environment, the Guyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment has set up treatment measures such as purification ponds and bypass wetlands by using the natural topography and landform, insisting on in-situ restoration and reducing human intervention. At the same time, local materials are used to maximize the use of river resources, and reeds, calamus, shallots, iris and other easy-to-grow and easy-to-live sewage-removing plants are planted according to the natural geography and climate to purify water quality.

"In the past, I could smell the smell of the reservoir at home, and sometimes I was embarrassed to let my friends come to the house, but now the environment is better, the smell is gone, and we are much more comfortable to live in." "Uncle Sun's family has lived by the Yuhe Lake for three generations, and now they have the impression that the smelly lake and reservoir are clear and green, and there are water birds from time to time, which has become a good place for citizens to relax and play. In 2023, the treatment of the Chongqing River was also selected as the second batch of excellent cases of beautiful rivers and lakes in the country.

Overcoming Development Problems and Promoting a New Path of Reform with Pollutant Emission Rights

Promoting the reform of pollutant discharge rights is a major measure for Ningxia to promote the ecological protection and high-quality development of the Yellow River Basin, as well as a major measure to promote the implementation of the ecological priority strategy and accelerate the construction of a green ecological treasure land in the autonomous region.

This work has made it difficult for the Guyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment. As a new thing, the first and most critical task of the reform of pollutant discharge rights is to "confirm rights" and find out the number of family funds. However, the economic development of Guyuan City is relatively backward, mainly private and private enterprises, the scale is small, the system is not perfect, the environmental management account is missing, it is difficult to find out, and the accounting of sewage discharge is even more difficult. In addition, the essence of the reform of emission rights is the transformation from the original free use of emission rights to paid transactions, so as to achieve the purpose of "who pollutes and pays" and "who reduces emissions and who benefits".

Li Qiang, chief of the environmental impact assessment and monitoring section of the Guyuan Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau, told reporters that in response to this situation, the Guyuan Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau has set up a special class for the reform of pollutant discharge rights, and has gone deep into the "four counties and one district" to conduct a comprehensive survey, and has established the "three accounts" of the current status account, the planning account and the environmental capacity account. At the same time, the implementation plan for the reform of the city's pollutant discharge rights has been formulated, and the goals, key tasks and promotion measures of the reform have been clarified.

Up to now, Guyuan City has carried out a total of 18 transactions of emission rights, trading 23.3 tons of sulfur dioxide and 29.26 tons of nitrogen oxides, with a cumulative transaction amount of 219,300 yuan, embarking on a new path of market-oriented emission reduction and institutionalized pollution control.

In the next step, the Guyuan Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment will continue to strengthen planning, fight the battle of pollution prevention and control, continue to promote the reform of pollutant discharge rights and carbon emission rights, strengthen team building, and protect the lucid waters and green mountains of Guyuan City.