Customs officials in Nanjing have arrested seven people on charges of smuggling over 4,000 tons of household toxic waste from the Netherlands from December to March. In one case, the Hepu Trading Co in Hefei, Anhui province, purchased banned imports containing toxic chemicals from a Taiwanese firm, which smuggled it from Dutch supplier Van Puijfelik, officials said. To pass the Customs’ check, the three sides conspired to claim the 30 shipping containers of goods were waste papers — allowable imports that are safe and recyclable. The imported trash caused many Customs officials inspecting the goods to suffer severe respiratory and skin infections. After buying the trash at low prices, the firm would pick out the “valuable” parts, including paper and plastics, to sell at high profit margins and dump the remaining trash. The Taiwanese Manager was arrested at Shanghai Hongqiao Airport on February 19 while Hepu’s Manager, surnamed Geng, was detained in Hefei. Authorities shipped the 30 containers back to the Netherlands. Officials found another 2,045 tons of household waste had been smuggled from Rotterdam, which was described as a gateway for trash bound for China and other developing countries. Chinese law bans imports of solid waste that cannot be used as raw materials or that poses a serious risk to the environment, the China Daily reports.

Shanghai saw 337 days, or 92.3%, of excellent and good air quality last year while the water environment remained stable, levels of acid rain, dust and noise pollution dropped and radiation was normal, the Shanghai Environmental Protection Bureau announced. It was the third consecutive year that Shanghai had more than 90% of high quality days. PM10 particles were the top pollutant on 356 days. Though the PM10 reading last year was higher than in 2010, Expo year, the overall density of PM10 dropped between 2007 and 2011, the Bureau said. The record of good air quality was expected to drop after Shanghai adopted the stricter PM2.5 measures. The Shanghai municipal government dealt with 1,154 environment-related cases in 2011, issuing fines totaling CNY42.5 million for breaches of environmental standards.

Foreign embassies releasing their own air-quality readings are contravening international conventions. “According to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, diplomats are duty-bound to respect the laws and regulations of their host countries and should not interfere in their domestic affairs,” Wu Xiaoqing, Vice Minister of Environmental Protection said. “The monitoring and release of information concerning China’s air quality is of public interest and falls under government responsibility. Consequently, foreign embassies monitoring and releasing air-quality readings on the internet do not conform to the two conventions and also violate regulations in China,” he added. Wu said only the Chinese government was authorized to monitor and release air quality information. The U.S. Embassy in Beijing releases regular online air quality readings, including PM2.5. Many times, the Embassy rated air quality in Beijing as “hazardous,” while the city’s Environmental Protection Bureau classified pollution as being “slight”. A U.S. Embassy Spokesman said the air-quality reports were meant to inform U.S. citizens living in the city. Vice Minister Wu said statistics from a single monitoring site should not be used to assess the air quality of a whole area. “It surely does not represent the overall air quality of a city.” He also emphasized differences in evaluating figures. While the figures themselves are often similar, China and the U.S. use different standards to evaluate them. Wu said that should be linked to the level of the country’s economic development and technology. By the end of October, almost 500 monitoring sites in 74 cities will be required to test for PM2.5. Daily average readings of PM2.5 at these cities will be announced to the public by the end of 2012. On June 4, Guangdong province started to release real time statistics for PM2.5 from 62 monitoring sites in the Pearl River Delta region, the first real time data in the country, the China Daily reports. Foreign Ministry Spokesman Liu Weimin added that embassies could collect air quality information for their own staff and diplomats, but this type of information should not be released to the public.

Vice Minister of Environmental Protection Wu Xiaoqing said the quality of near-shore water in north China’s Bohai Sea and the East China Sea, as well as water in five of the nine bays along China’s coast was “extremely poor.” Wu said that of 469 stations monitoring water quality along 10 major river basins, including the Yangtze river, the Yellow river and the Pearl river, 61% reported ratings of between first and third grade last year, which means water that can be used as natural reserves and drinking water. But 25.3% of rivers were rated as fourth or fifth grade, meaning the water could not be used without suitable treatment, while 13.7% were below fifth grade, with water only fit for use in agriculture. Wu said that of 26 major lakes and reservoirs under state monitoring, 53.8% were affected by eutrophication — where excess nutrients spur excessive plant growth. Among 4,727 groundwater monitoring sites in 200 cities, the water quality of 45% has been excellent, good or relatively good, but the other 55% was poor or very poor.

In many Chinese cities, where countless factories once stood, now there are towering office blocks, luxury apartments and underground shopping malls. The air, usually, is cleaner and there are parks and tree-lined roads. But in the soil, and in the water table lurk hidden dangers. The factories may have closed or moved away, but they left the ground where they once stood soaked with toxic chemicals. Millions of people now live on tainted land – and most of them know nothing about it. The government has done a nationwide survey to estimate the extent of the problem and a CNY100 billion five-year remediation plan will follow the survey, which found that the total contaminated land covers about 200,000 square kilometers – twice the size of Iceland. More than a dozen regions, including the Beijing and Shanghai areas were rated by the survey as being in serious need of immediate remedial action. The value of apartments in buildings on contaminated sites may drop sharply, analysts warned. Officials said the results of the survey would soon be made public but did not say whether the release of information would be partial or complete. Thousands of firms are likely to benefit from the clean-up, especially those specialized in advanced soil remediation technology. People living on untreated industrial sites face health threats ranging from skin rashes to cancer. Research by CAS’ Institute of Soil Sciences showed that a large quantity of untreated toxic soil has been reused since 2000.