Design of the Pollutant Emission Standard System of China in Context of Circular Economy

Based on the principle of circular economy and marginal cost emission control, a framework of pollutant emission standard system including the control cost, extent and speed elements was brought forward. The system covered the whole pollutant life cycle and was composed of four parts, i.e. environmental protection technical policy for raw materials, environmental protection technical policy for production, end-of-pipe treatment policy and emission standards, and technical policy for waste disposal. The individual control extents of the four sub-policies depended on marginal control costs, with preferential implementation for lower cost control links. The emission standards would be graded based on the technical advanced degrees, which could promote continuous improvement for environmental technology and provide correct predications to the society. By establishment of the standard development and updating mechanism, the emission standard system could identify automatically the priorities of implementation fields and thus be optimized and adjusted by itself at an appropriate speed.