PLA makes steady progress in environmental protection

On the occasion of "June 5" World Environment Day, according to the latest information released by the Environmental Protection and Afforestation Committee of Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA), in the past year, the Chinese PLA as well as the Chinese People's Armed Police Force (APF) achieved significant results in strengthening the military ecological and environmental protection and construction, controlling the emission of major pollutants and preventing and controlling environmental pollution.

After the Ministry of Environmental Protection of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the General Logistics Department (GLD) of the Chinese PLA jointly issued the Opinions on Further Promoting the Military-civilian Integrated Development of Environmental Protection last year, the stationed units around the Bohai Sea have constructed a number of projects in compliance with the State Council's Overall Plan for the Environmental Protection of Bohai Sea to treat wastewater, solid wastes and ship pollution and have achieved effective treatment on various key pollution sources.

The PLA has strengthened the operation and management of 500-plus wastewater treatment stations, with the daily capacity of wastewater treatment increased to 400,000-plus tons, and the daily recycled water reuse reaching 70,000-plus tons. The PLA troop units stationed in the national key river basins and areas have reached the target accomplishment rate of 80% for the domestic wastewater treatment, and 40% for recycled water reuse.

The PLA environmental protection and afforestation department has also worked with the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau to accomplish the construction of the online monitoring system for the pollution treatment facilities of the military hospitals stationed in Beijing so as to realize the automated network monitoring.

Approved by Hu Jintao, chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) of the PRC, The Regulations of the Chinese People's Liberation Army on the Prevention and Control of Radioactive Pollution will soon be announced and implemented to provide the legal basis for strengthening the PLA's work on the prevention and control of radioactive pollution as well as the protection of the environmental safety for PLA personnel and equipment.

The PLA has also completed the environmental impact assessment of 58 large-scale barrack construction projects.

The first PLA cross-arm nuclear and chemical environmental pollution emergency monitoring and detection drill was held in Beijing on September 4, 2011, which marked the progress of the PLA environmental monitoring and detection organizations onto a new level in terms of the capability of emergency monitoring and response as well as coordination and command.