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The Environment

Land Use Planning

For major land use planning studies, strategic environmental assessments are required to incorporate environmental considerations into the formulation of land use plans. Under the EIA Ordinance, an EIA must be carried out as part of the engineering feasibility study of urban development or redevelopment projects with a study area of more than 20 hectares or involving a population of more than 100,000 people. These environmental assessments are integral parts of the planning studies and help identify major environmental issues and possible mitigation measures for inclusion in the land use plans.

Environmental Management and Sustainability

The government promotes environmental management in both the public and private sectors. through the Green Manager Scheme, environmental auditing, environmental management systems and environmental performance reporting. All bureaus and departments have appointed green managers and publish annual reports of their environmental performance. Since 2007, all these reports incorporate, where appropriate, the principles of the 'Clean Air Charter' which the government supports to improve Hong Kong's air quality. To promote environmental performance reporting in the private sector, a dedicated EPD webpage provides links to the environmental and sustainability reports of listed companies in Hong Kong who choose to share this information.

Sewage disposal facilities in the rural areas

Improvements continue to sewage disposal facilities in the rural areas of the New Territories and in 2013 the government drew up plans to invest further in projects providing public sewers to convey domestic discharges from villages in rural and other un-sewered areas to sewage treatment works. Loan and grant schemes for eligible householders to connect houses to public sewers are available.

Air Pollution

The Environment Bureau released 'A Clean Air Plan for Hong Kong' in March, outlining the air quality challenges Hong Kong faces. It also gives an overview of the policies, measures and plans to tackle air pollution covering land and sea transport, power plants and industrial operations, and of collaboration between Guangdong and Hong Kong to deal with regional pollution to attain cleaner air and a healthier living environment.

The Air Pollution Control (Amendment) Ordinance 2013 was enacted in July to introduce new Air Quality Objectives (AQOs) from 1 January 2014. The new AQOs, benchmarked against targets under the World Health Organisation's Air Quality Guidelines, are broadly comparable to the air quality standards adopted by the European Union and the United States. The ordinance requires the AQOS to be reviewed at least once every five years.

The government launched a new health risk-based Air Quality Health Index (AQHI) system on 30 December 2013, replacing the Air Pollution Index system. The AQHI provides information about public health risks due to air pollution and gives advance warning of serious air pollution to enable the public (especially susceptible groups such as children, the elderly and those with heart or respiratory illnesses) to take precautionary measures.

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