ENG-1999 — Page 463

THE ENVIRONMENT

Potentially Hazardous Installations and Dangerous Goods Transport

Installations such as explosive depots and chemical stores, and dangerous goods transport routes may pose a risk to nearby residents. Hong Kong has had no major disasters but global experience of large-scale accidents highlights the need for risk. management.

The Government has completed risk assessments on all potentially hazardous installations in Hong Kong. It has completed or is implementing all its plans for risk reduction and has substantially reduced the risk to the public.

Legislation and Pollution Control

Hong Kong has seven main laws to control pollution. They are the Waste Disposal Ordinance, the Water Pollution Control Ordinance, the Air Pollution Control Ordinance, the Noise Control Ordinance, the Ozone Layer Protection Ordinance, the Dumping at Sea Ordinance and the Environmental Impact Assessment Ordinance. Most of these laws have subsidiary regulations and other statutory provisions, such as technical memoranda, to give effect to the principal laws.

The Government has adopted a system of environmental quality objectives as a general principle in its pollution control laws. The objectives are set at levels that will meet environmental goals, such as the protection of public health or the preservation of a natural ecosystem. The system aims to achieve the required environmental benefit in the most cost-effective and economically sustainable manner. Limits imposed on polluting emissions are no more stringent or costly than is necessary to achieve the conservation goal, which also makes the maximum safe use of the environment's natural capacity to absorb and recycle wastes.

EPD inspectors made more than 73 420 inspections to enforce control on air, noise, waste and water pollution in 1999. These included regular checks on environmental compliance and investigations of pollution complaints from the community. The enforcement work resulted in more than 1 681 convictions and $22.9 million in fines. To streamline enforcement operation, the EPD will set up multi-skilled teams which can deal with all types of pollution problems at any single site inspection.

Air Pollution

Air quality in Hong Kong is typical of any large modern city. Diesel smoke and fine dust in the urban areas are the most pressing problems, causing a nuisance and constituting a serious health concern. In 1999, non-compliance of the air quality objectives for total suspended particulates (dust), respirable suspended particulates (fine dust), and nitrogen dioxide were recorded in several districts, including the busy city centres such as Causeway Bay, Central and Mong Kok. Since July, an hourly air pollution index has been made available to the community through the mass media, and the department's web site at http://www.info.gov.hklepdl.

Hong Kong's objectives for air quality are comparable with standards adopted in developed countries. The EPD completed a review of these objectives in 1998, and has made its recommendations in 1999.

To put matters in perspective, Hong Kong has less than two-thirds the level of respirable particulates found in Mexico City and lower than the levels in Kuala Lumpur and Barcelona. Carbon monoxide levels are about one-seventh that found in

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