The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has released the “Provisional Measures for the Recognition Criteria and Administration of Chemical Industrial Parks” (Draft for Public Comment).

On April 15, the Raw Materials Industry Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued a notice on its official website soliciting public comments on the “Provisional Measures for the Recognition Criteria and Administration of Chemical Industrial Parks” (draft for public comment). The deadline for submitting comments is May 15, 2021.

The full text of the “Provisional Measures for the Recognition Criteria and Administration of Chemical Industrial Parks” (Draft for Public Comment) is as follows:

Provisional Measures for the Recognition Criteria and Administration of Chemical Industrial Parks

(Draft for Public Comment)

Chapter I General Provisions

Article 1: In order to standardize the development of chemical industrial parks, enhance their intrinsic safety and green development, and promote the high-quality growth of the chemical industry, this Measures is formulated in accordance with the requirements and relevant standards set forth in documents such as the “Opinions on Comprehensively Strengthening Work on Production Safety of Hazardous Chemicals,” the “Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Standardized Development of Chemical Industrial Parks,” the “Provisional Guidelines for Identifying and Addressing Safety Risks in Chemical Industrial Parks,” and the “Comprehensive Evaluation Guidelines for Chemical Industrial Parks.”

Article 2: A chemical industrial park refers to an industrial park composed of multiple interconnected chemical enterprises, oriented toward the development of the petrochemical and chemical industries, with clearly defined geographical boundaries and a distinct management entity, and equipped with well‑developed infrastructure and a comprehensive management system. This includes specialized chemical parks approved or recognized by the relevant authorities, as well as relatively independently established chemical parks (zones) within various types of development zones.

Article 3: In principle, chemical industrial parks shall be approved for establishment by people’s governments at or above the prefectural level, and their designation shall be undertaken by the provincial people’s government or an agency authorized by it.

Chapter 2: Basic Requirements

Article 4: The establishment of a chemical industrial park shall comply with all statutory procedures, have clearly defined land area and boundary limits, and, in accordance with the law, conduct planning environmental impact assessments, comprehensive safety risk assessments, and other relevant studies.

Article 5: Chemical industrial parks shall establish a management body with clearly defined responsibilities and an appropriate balance of authority and accountability, possessing effective capabilities in areas such as production safety, environmental protection, and emergency response, and ensuring that all relevant requirements are fully implemented. The management body of the chemical industrial park shall be staffed with personnel adequate to meet the park’s needs for safety management and environmental protection.

Article 6: The siting and layout of chemical industrial parks shall comply with relevant laws, regulations, policies, and related plans, and shall meet the requirements for ecological and environmental protection, workplace safety, emergency rescue, resource utilization, integrated disaster prevention and mitigation, and transportation.

Site selection is strictly prohibited in areas such as seismic fault zones, regions prone to geological hazards, areas with adverse engineering‑geological conditions, ecological protection red lines, permanent basic farmland, nature reserves, drinking water source protection zones, and other environmentally sensitive areas. Chemical industrial parks shall maintain adequate external safety buffer distances from urban built-up areas, densely populated zones, critical facilities, and sensitive targets, and establish perimeter land-use planning safety control lines to ensure sufficient development space for the park.

Article 7: Chemical industrial parks shall prepare both an industrial plan and a master plan. The industrial plan shall be formulated in light of local land resources, industrial foundations, water resources, environmental carrying capacity, logistics, transportation, and other fundamental conditions, and shall be consistent with national policies on the petrochemical and chemical industries as well as the regional development plans for these sectors. The master plan shall include chapters on production safety, fire-fighting and rescue, ecological and environmental protection, and comprehensive disaster prevention and mitigation, or shall separately develop corresponding specialized plans.

Article 8: Chemical industrial parks shall formulate a “prohibition, restriction, and control” catalog tailored to the region’s characteristics and local conditions. A project appraisal system for entry into the park shall be established, and projects seeking to enter the park must comply with industrial policies and the relevant requirements of major national regional development strategies.

Article 9: Chemical industrial parks shall undertake unified planning, construction, and management of public utilities—including industrial water, domestic water, electricity, heating, and industrial gases—sufficient to meet the needs of industrial development.

Article 10: Chemical industrial parks shall, as necessary, construct public utility tunnels for the inter‑enterprise conveyance of chemicals, steam, wastewater, and other substances, and shall equip such tunnels with ancillary facilities, including lighting, collision‑prevention systems, and fire‑fighting and emergency response equipment.

Article 11: Chemical industrial parks shall be equipped with dedicated centralized treatment facilities for chemical wastewater—either independently constructed or integrated with key enterprises—and corresponding pipeline networks, ensuring that 100% of production wastewater generated within the park is collected via the municipal network, centrally treated, and discharged in compliance with regulatory standards. The sewage collection network shall be designed in accordance with local climatic conditions and practical circumstances; as a general rule, open‑channel pipelines should be used with pressurized discharge, and online monitoring and valve control must be implemented for wastewater entering the system.

Article 12: Chemical industrial parks shall be equipped with the capacity to collect 100% of hazardous waste, and their facilities for the collection, utilization, and disposal of hazardous waste shall be planned and constructed in a coordinated manner, taking into account both the park’s hazardous waste generation and the available hazardous waste treatment and disposal capacities in the surrounding area.

Article 13: Chemical industrial parks shall, in accordance with relevant regulations, conduct risk assessments for the transportation of raw materials and products, among other related tasks.

Article 14: Chemical industrial parks shall, in accordance with the principles of “classified control, tiered management, and phased implementation,” and taking into account factors such as industrial structure, supply-chain characteristics, and types of safety risks, adopt zoned, closed‑management measures. They shall establish comprehensive access‑control and video‑surveillance systems to implement full‑process oversight over the entry and exit of materials, personnel, and vehicles involving flammable, explosive, toxic, hazardous chemicals, and hazardous waste. Chemical industrial parks where vehicle concentrations of hazardous chemicals pose significant safety risks are encouraged to construct dedicated parking facilities for such vehicles and to enforce stringent management protocols.

Article 15: Chemical industrial parks shall establish systems, emergency response plans, and platforms that meet the requirements for emergency rescue in the event of production safety accidents, environmental pollution incidents, and other emergencies.

Article 16: Chemical industrial parks shall, in accordance with their scale and industrial structure, establish a comprehensive system for monitoring and controlling occupational safety risks and ecological environmental conditions. Relevant monitoring and surveillance data shall be integrated into the local monitoring and early-warning system.

Article 17: Chemical industrial parks are encouraged to, on the basis of their existing safety and environmental risk monitoring and surveillance systems, establish a risk monitoring and early-warning system covering the entire park, as well as a full‑life‑cycle management system for hazardous chemicals within the park.

Article 18: Chemical industrial parks shall be functionally zoned and rationally laid out, with administrative offices, residential facilities, and other areas of high population concentration physically separated from the production and storage zones for hazardous chemicals, maintaining adequate safety distances.

Chapter 3: Park Development

Article 19: Chemical industrial parks shall adhere to the principles of coordinated and coupled development across the upstream and downstream segments of the industrial chain. In accordance with the requirements of waste reduction, reuse, and resource recovery, they shall adopt efficient, energy‑saving, and clean production processes; promote process innovation and technological upgrading; advance the comprehensive, resource‑based utilization of by‑products within the park; and strive to achieve intensive clustering of industries, circular and efficient operations, and the maximization of cascaded energy utilization.

Article 20: Chemical industrial parks and the enterprises within them are encouraged to adopt next-generation information technologies, such as 5G communication and artificial intelligence, to enhance the parks’ levels of informatization, digitalization, and intelligentization. They should build digital workshops and smart factories, comprehensively integrate the parks’ information resources, and employ a variety of approaches to develop smart chemical industrial parks, thereby strengthening their capabilities in sensing, monitoring, early warning, response, and evaluation, and elevating the overall level of park‑wide integrated management and control.

Article 21: Chemical industrial parks and the enterprises within them shall, in accordance with intrinsic safety requirements, establish HSE management systems and Responsible Care frameworks, fulfill their primary responsibility for workplace safety, classify and label the chemicals they produce in compliance with the “Classification and Labelling of Chemicals” standards, conduct regular training, practice Responsible Care, continuously improve health, safety, and environmental performance, and, as required, proactively disclose relevant park‑related information to the public, thereby enhancing the satisfaction of local communities.

Chapter IV Supplementary Provisions

Article 22: Each region shall, based on its local economic and social development conditions and in accordance with the basic requirements of these Measures, formulate and refine its own regulations for the recognition and evaluation of chemical industrial parks, as well as detailed implementation rules and scoring criteria.

Article 23: These Provisions shall be interpreted by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in conjunction with the relevant departments.

Article 24: These provisions shall take effect as of the date of their promulgation.