Three departments, including the General Office of the Ministry of Transport ("MOT"), have recently issued the Guiding Opinions on Establishing and Improving the Joint Regulation System for the Transfer and Disposal of Water Pollutants from Vessels (the "Opinions").
The Opinions provide for general requirements, category-based administration, document requirements, regulatory requirements, safeguard measures, etc. Among others, the Opinions state that all relevant departments shall work together to set up a whole-process and closed-loop administrative mechanism to oversee key processes of transferring and disposing of water pollutants discharged by vessels, apply advanced technologies and equipment to cut energy consumption and costs of the disposal, intensify the integration of information platforms and the sharing of data resources, and thus boost their capacity for joint regulation. Moreover, the Opinions require that the receipt, transfer and disposal of water pollutants discharged by vessels, including the temporary storage and preliminary disposal, transfer, and combined transportation, shall be effectively linked with each other through relevant documents. Entities at the rear end of the disposal chain shall provide entities at the front end of such chain with corresponding receipt and disposal documents. Efforts are also encouraged to develop the regulation information system to make it possible to electronically circulate documents.