环境保护部环境规划院
Study on Design of Wastewater Tax: from Wastewater Pollutant
Discharge Levy to Environmental Tax
Ge Chazhong Chinese Academy For Environmental Planning
Nov 4, 2010 Bangkok
环境保护部环境规划院
Why This Topic?
Governme Research topic under National
Water Pollution Control Key Special
Program for 11th five year period
ntal decision on introducing environmental
tax
Issues related to pollution levy on water
pollutants discharge
环境保护部环境规划院
Presentation Outline
Brief introduction
Comparison
Design
Obstacle
Conclusion
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I. Brief introduction of China’s wastewater pollutant discharge levy policy
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I. Brief introduction
The first economic policy for
environmental protection in China• In late 1970s• “polluter pay principle”• According to the amount of
pollutants discharged using pollutant equevelents
• played a positive role
环境保护部环境规划院
I. Brief introduction
• Nationwide policy–31 provincial level–333 prefecture level –2,860 county level cities
环境保护部环境规划院
I. Brief introduction
• 80.775 billion Yuan (RMB) (From the new regulation in 2003 to the end of June 2009) including water and air pollutants as well as solid wastes
• 147.95 billion Yuan (RMB) (the cumulatively fees in about 30 years from 1982)
环境保护部环境规划院
Figure 1 Water Pollution Discharge fee Collection in 2004-2009 (Data source: Statistical Yearbook on Environment for All Years)
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I. Brief introduction
• wastewater and waste gas large proportion
• wastewater pollutant discharge fee a down trend
• waste gas an upward trend
• noise and hazardous waste a very small proportion and does not change considerably
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I. Brief introduction
Causes of declining trend for water pollutant
urban wastewater treatment facilities being put into use
New policies on reducing emissions from “concentration control ” to
“ total quantity control ”
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I. Brief introduction
Need to improve• Legal basis for discharge levy
system is insufficient • Pollutant discharge charge rates
are low and levied scopes are incomplete
• Levy procedure is complicated and workload is high
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II. Comparison between wastewater
pollutant discharge levy and
environmental tax
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II. Comparison
Both are economic instruments in accordance with the principle of “polluter pay principle”Both can contribute to pollution reduction through internalizing external cost
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II. Comparison
differences• different roles• different recognitions • different departments for
implementing these policies• different use of funds
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Can wastewater tax solve problems
of low collection rate of wastewater
pollutant discharge levy???
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II. Comparison
• can raise the collection rate to some extent
• may not be quickly raised to a very high level due to different reasons for current low collection rate
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III. Design for wastewater tax
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III. Design
basic principles to design wastewater tax:Effectiveness Fairness Operability
Effectiveness
Simple tax base Stable revenue
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III. Design
Collection object and scope• wastewater discharged from
pollution sources, including industrial ones and urban WWTPs
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III. Design
Taxpayer all those that discharge
wastewater to water body, including industrial enterprises, public institutions, commercial and service enterprises, wastewater treatment plants and other organizations and excluding residents.
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III. Design
Tax base and its calculationwastewater emission quantity
Tax amount payable = wastewater emission quantity ×industrial pollution intensity factor × unit tax amount
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III. DesignIndustry Pollution intensity factor Nonferrous metal alloy manufacturing 0.5 Inorganic base production 0.5 Machine finish paper and paper board production 1.2 Dye production 2.5 Complex fertilizer production 1.0 Beer production 0.5 Hoisting and conveying equipment manufacturing 1.0 Refit vehicle manufacturing 0.8 Entire vehicle manufacturing 0.5 Manufacturing of tracked special purpose vehicles for industries and mines
0.5
环境保护部环境规划院
III. Design
Enterprises have the emission quantity data by monitoring and being verified by environmental protection departments, the quantity data should be used first as tax base.
Otherwise, follow this formula : Wastewater emission quantity =
water intake quantity (product yield) ×wastewater emission factor
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III. Design
Tax rate0.2Yuan(RMB)/ton Tax rate should be determined to be higher
than pollution treatment cost and enterprises’ bearing capability should be considered
In the preliminary stage it can be approximately equivalent to the present discharge levy rates
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III. Design
Tax preference• The enterprises that adopt
advanced technologies and install and normally operate wastewater treatment system should be given preferential policies
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(III) Comparison between wastewater emission tax amount and discharge fee collection amount
Discharge fee (10,000Yuan)
Enterprise name
Fresh water
consumption
(10,000t)
Wastewater
emission
amount
(10,000t)
COD Ammonia
nitrogen Petroleum Total
Calculation of
emission tax
amount
(10,000Yuan)
Nonferrous metal
alloy manufacturing 271.53 43.41 2.68 0.80 2.48 5.97 4.34
Inorganic base
production 353.70 2.48 12.10 2.38 0.04 14.53 0.25
Machine finish
paper and paper
board production
156.00 98.00 1.45 1.45 23.52
Machine finish
paper and paper
board production
22.50 10.80 1.08 1.08 2.59
Complex fertilizer
production 57.30 10.60 0.30 0.30 2.12
Beer production 61.35 41.40 1.28 0.01 1.29 4.14
Hoisting and
conveying
equipment
manufacturing
10.93 2.73 0.09 0.09 0.55
Refit vehicle
manufacturing 9.86 4.50 0.31 0.04 0.35 0.72
Entire vehicle
manufacturing 117.60 82.32 0.72 0.02 0.74 8.23
Manufacturing of
tracked special
purpose vehicles for
industries and mines
3.66 2.93 0.08 0.01 0.08 0.29
Entire vehicle
manufacturing 23.38 19.87 0.87 0.50 1.37 1.99
Total 1087.82 319.04 20.96 3.20 3.09 27.24 52.88 Table 2 Comparison between Enterprises’ Wastewater Discharge fee
Collection Amount and Wastewater tax Amount
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IV. Analyze the obstacle for changing
wastewater pollutant discharge fee to
wastewater tax
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IV. The obstacle
Institutional obstacleThe relationship between
environmental protection departments and pollution emitting enterprises will be greatly reduced
The deterrence of environmental protection departments is weakened
How to balance the benefits of different regions is a difficulty
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IV. The obstacle
Technical obstacleEmission collection rate is
difficult to be directly converted to tax rate
Tax base of wastewater tax is difficult to be calculated
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IV. The obstacle
Policy coordination• Its combination with financial system
reform must be considered • It is necessary to consider how to
ensure the fund for environmental protection investment through financial policies
• It is necessary to accurately deal with relations with present value added tax, consumption tax, resource tax, customs dues and income tax
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V. Conclusion
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V. Conclusion
Compared with charge, tax has some
advantages:• Tax collection to some extent can
overcome charge randomness, arrears and refusal to pay
• Combining wastewater tax with other taxes can save collection cost
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V. Conclusion
• Some obstacles still exist in converting discharge fees into environmental tax
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V. Conclusion
• It is inappropriate to convert wastewater pollutant discharge levy to wastewater tax in the near term.