SUN Jueqi    Law School

Abstract: With the continuous development of China's ecological civilization construction, China's reformed emission permit system has officially entered the implementation stage. The pollution permit management system is a systematic project related to social public interests and one of the important means of government environmental regulation. Public participation is an important link in the pollution permit management system. During the period, the Guiding Opinions on Strengthening the Law Enforcement and Supervision of Pollutant Discharge Permits clearly proposed to strengthen public participation in pollutant discharge permits. In theory, emission permit is a process behavior, so the whole process of permit application, issuance and daily management needs the effective participation of the public to ensure the fairness and authenticity of emission permit management. At present, there are still many legal problems to be solved in the public participation in the emission permit hearing in China. First, the public participation system of the emission permit hearing is not sound, which is mainly manifested in the narrow scope of the participants in the emission permit hearing, the unclear situation of the application of the hearing and the inflexible hearing method. These problems will lead to the poor operability of the public participation in the emission permit hearing. Secondly, the public participation in the emission permit issuance stage is not smooth, which is mainly manifested in the difficulty of the public to participate in the on-site verification of the emission permit audit and the insufficient participation of the public in the issuance of the permit, making the public participation system almost missing in the emission permit issuance stage. Finally, the public participation rules in the daily management of emission permits are not perfect, which are reflected in a series of problems such as the limited impact of public feedback on the enforcement of emission permits, the insufficient participation of the public in the daily management of emission permits, and the unclear scope of information disclosure. The lack or imperfection of rules in the daily supervision of emission permits has damaged the public's right to know and supervise the environment to a certain extent. By learning from the beneficial institutional experience of public participation in the emission permit outside the country and based on the basic national conditions of China, the public participation mechanism in the emission permit should be improved from the following aspects: first, the public participation system of the emission permit hearing should be improved, and the subject, application and mode of the emission permit hearing should be further refined; Secondly, we should unblock the public participation channels in the emission permit issuance stage, and ensure the effective participation of the public in the emission permit issuance stage by establishing the on-site verification witness system and adding the public opinion solicitation procedure before the emission permit issuance; Finally, it is also necessary to improve the public participation rules in the daily management of pollution discharge permits, clarify the frequency of law enforcement of pollutant discharge units with strong public response, add the system of pollutant discharge permit supervisors and clarify the scope of information disclosure of pollution discharge permits, and ensure the public's right to know and supervision in the daily management of pollution discharge permits.

Read the article here:    排污许可中的公众参与法律问题研究.pdf