Ying, Song --- "International Legal Aspect of the Songhua River Incident" [2008] ELECD 353; in Faure, Michael; Ying, Song (eds), "China and International Environmental Liability" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2008)

Book Title: China and International Environmental Liability

Editor(s): Faure, Michael; Ying, Song

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847207524

Section: Chapter 12

Section Title: International Legal Aspect of the Songhua River Incident

Author(s): Ying, Song

Number of pages: 18

Extract:

12. International legal aspect of the
Songhua River incident
Song Ying

1 INTRODUCTION

Since the Songhua River spill incident of November 2005, environmental
pollution, especially water pollution, remains a heated topic in China, espe-
cially with the recent publication of the new draft on the revised Water
Pollution Prevention and Control Law (1996 WPPCL), the aim of which is
to invite comments and suggestions from the public. This Songhua River
incident, apart from the initial shock to both China and beyond, provided
a good case study to examine many of the difficult issues and challenges
facing China in her pursuit of a more sustainable pattern of economic and
social development. Two other contributions in this book have discussed
the domestic legal aspect of the incident; therefore the purpose of this
chapter is to focus on the international legal aspect of this incident.


2 SONGHUA RIVER SPILL AND SUBSEQUENT
DEVELOPMENT

On 13 November 2005, an explosion occurred at a petrochemical plant (No.
101 Plant or the Jilin Benzhydrol Plant) of Jilin Petrochemical Corporation,
located in the city of Jilin of Jilin Province in the north-eastern part of
China. In the process of fire fighting, about 100 tons of benzene, aniline and
nitrobenzene, together with fire fighting water, spilled into the No. 2
Songhua River.1 In order to dilute the pollutants' concentration, the water
flow from the upstream Fengman hydroelectric power station into the river
was increased. As a result, the pollutants spread into an over 80 kilometre
long pollution ...