The Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) halted an ongoing PX (p-Xylene) project in Zhangzhou, Fujian Province on Thursday due to its violation of an environmental protection law, 21st Century Business Herald reported on Friday.
An announcement published by MEP on its website on January 21 said the project started construction without obtaining environmental evaluation approval from MEP. The ministry ordered the company to stop the project immediately and be fined 200,000 yuan ($32,120).
According to the announcement, an investigation by the MEP found the Xiang Lu Dragon Group started construction work after it changed its raw production material, violating China's environmental law. The MEP notified the group on December 14 of the violation and penalty. The company chose not to make any legal appeal and claimed on January 4 they had accepted the punishment. The company cannot restart work before they receive MEP approval.
The Zhangzhou PX project was moved from neighboring Xiamen in 2009 after approval by State Council. The project was originally planned to be built in Xiamen in 2007. However, a massive protest among local residents because of fears around health threats associated with PX caused it to eventually be canceled.
On August 2011 and October 2012, local residents in Dalian, Liaoning Province and Ningbo, Zhejiang Province held massive demonstrations against planned local PX projects. Both projects were canceled as a result.
Publicly available information shows the PX project is the biggest foreign capital investment project in Zhangzhou, involving total investment of 13.8 billion yuan and it planned to produce 800,000 tons of PX products annually.
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