100 tonnes of pollutants spilled into Chinese river | China

December 2020 ยท 3 minute read

100 tonnes of pollutants spilled into Chinese river

Around 100 tonnes of pollutants flowed into the Songhua river in the chemical spill that forced a Chinese city to cut off water supplies to almost four million people, it was reported today.

The reports came as another industrial accident brought fears of a new pollution crisis hundreds of miles away.

Chinese media said the Songhua spill, caused by an explosion at a chemical factory in the city of Jilin on November 13, resulted in an 80km (50 mile) stretch of benzene flowing down the river to the north-eastern city of Harbin.

Officials initially kept news of the explosion secret and instead said water supplies were being cut off so routine maintenance could be carried out - a decision criticised in the country's usually docile media.

"If information is not given in a timely, accurate and transparent manner, it will leave room for rumours to spread," a column in the China Youth Daily newspaper said.

As officials faced growing questions over their handling of the crisis, it emerged that plans to restore Harbin's water supplies by tomorrow would probably have to be postponed.

The city's deputy Communist party secretary, Du Yuxin, said water could instead be switched back on by Monday. "All the citizens are showing high spirits," he added. "We have the confidence and ability to overcome this difficulty."

State television programmes attempted to depict a situation comfortably under control, screening footage of workers installing new water filtering material at Harbin's main water plant.

The decision to cut off Harbin's water supply on Tuesday sparked panic buying that cleared supermarket shelves of bottled water and soft drinks. City authorities brought in truckloads of drinking water and ordered a price freeze to prevent overcharging.

The government has defended its handling of the situation following the Jilin blast, in which five people were killed. However, experts have questioned how untreated water could have reached the Songhua river, voicing concerns over plans for dealing with such emergencies.

Government officials blamed the chemical plant's owners, the state-run China National Petroleum Corp, for the accident, and said it could face criminal charges.

"Authorities acted that day, and not one person has been sickened," Zhang Lijun, the deputy director of the State Environmental Protection Administration, told a Beijing news conference. "We will be very clear about who's responsible. It is the chemical plant of the CNPC."

Authorities said human error at a tower processing benzene, a potentially cancer-causing chemical, had caused the crisis. In a statement carried by the official Xinhua News Agency, the company apologised for the disaster.

The benzene spill reached Harbin early yesterday and was expected to take 40 hours to clear the city. Concern over the pollution was today growing in neighbouring Russia, where officials in Khabarovsk, 435 miles downriver, said they were not getting enough information from China.

Today's chemical plant accident prompted fears of a further benzene leak and warnings to residents not to drink river water, Xinhua reported today. It happened at the Yingte Chemical Company in Dianjiang, in the south-western region of Chongqing, where one worker was killed.

Nearby schools were closed and around 6,000 people were evacuated, the Beijing Daily Messenger newspaper said.

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