Managing the Risks of New Pollutants in China: The Perspective of Policy Integration

New pollutants, which have been gaining increasing attention
in
China in recent years, are largely results of the production, use,
and disposal of chemicals that are of great economic value. Managing
new pollutants requires a high degree of policy coordination through
the life cycle of chemicals and a balanced consideration of multiple
social objectives. From the perspective of policy integration, we
analyzed the current regulatory regime for managing new pollutants.
Major findings include: (1) guiding principles and instruments exist
for balancing social, environmental, and economic objectives, which
can be used directly or after revision to guide new pollutants management;
(2) part of the existing regulations can be used to incorporate new
pollutants after revision, while new regulations are badly needed
to prevent, minimize, and cleanup new pollutants during the whole
process of their production, use, and disposal; and (3) complementary
policies such as information-based policies and policies for facilitating
research and development are rather weak. Further research and practical
efforts should be directed to mainstreaming new pollutants into the
existing regulatory regime, developing supplemental policies for managing
new pollutants, and designing complementary policies to facilitate
the design and implementation of policies for managing new pollutants.