China - Fujian Highway Sector Investment Project : environmental assessment (Vol. 3 of 5) : Environmental action plan

El 382 VOL. 3 Fujian Provincial Road Development World Bank Loan Project Changchun-Shenzhen National Arterial Trunkway Yong'an-Wuping Highway (Fujian-Guangdong border) in Fujian Province Environmental Action Plan Constructed by: Fujian Provincial Expressway General Commanding Office Sanming Yong-Wu Highway Limited Company Longyan Yong-Wu Highway Limited Company Prepared by: Ministry of Communications Highway Research Institute March 2006   Environmental Action Plan of Yong-Wu Highway Table of Contents 1. Forewords .......................................................................................1 2. Major adverse impacts on the environment ........................................................2 3. Mitigation measures for environmental impacts ..................................4 3.1 Design period .........................................................4 3.2 Construction period ................................................6 3.3 Operation period ......................................................... 19 4. Implementing organizations and obligations for environmental management ............. 24 4.1 Implementing organization ............... .......................................... 24 4.2 Environment management plan ....................................... 26 4.3 Supervising organizations ........................................... 36 5. Environmental monitoring plan ............. ............................................ 39 6. Competence development and environmental protection training plan ......................................... 41 7. Implementation progress and cost estimate ......................................................... 43 i   Environmental Action Plan of Yong-Wu Highway 1. Forewords The ((Environmental Action Plan)) of Yong'an-Wuping (Fujian and Guangdong border) Highway (Yong-Wu Highway for short) in Fujian Province is based on its ((Environmental Impact Assessment Report)) (Second Edition). The mitigation measures and the monitoring and training plans proposed in this report have been discussed by the design institute, the construction unit, the imnmigrant and resettlement office, and environment management department; and consensus of opinion has been achieved with the Project Office and Fujian Provincial Expressway General Commanding Office. The implementation of the environmental action plan for Yong-Wu Highway in Fujian Province will be organized by Fujian Provincial Expressway General Commanding Office, which, together with Sanming Yong-Wu Highway Company and Longyan Yong-Wu Highway Company will be responsible for implementing the environmental protection measures for this project during the design, construction, and operation periods. The preparation of this action plan is based on: (1) ((People's Republic of China Law on Environmental Protection)); (2) ((People's Republic of China Law on Environmental Impact Assessment)) (3) ((People's Republic of China Law on Water and Soil Conservation)); (4) ((People's Republic of China Law on Land Management)); (5) ((People's Republic of China Law on Prevention and Control of Ambient Noise Pollution)); (6) ((People's Republic of China Law on the Prevention and Treatment of Water Pollution )) (7) ((People's Republic of China Law on Air Pollution Prevention)); (8) ((People's Republic of China Law on Solid Waste Pollution Prevention)); (9) ((People's Republic of China Law on Cultural Relics Protection)); (10) ((People's Republic of China Law on Road)); (11) ((Environmental Protection Management Regulations of Construction Project)) [State Council ordinance No. 253, 1998.11.18]; (12) ((Environmental Protection Management Regulations of Road Construction Project)) [Ministry of Communications ordinance No. 5, 2003]; (13) ((Notice on Strengthening Environmental Impact Assessment for Construction Project loaned by International Financial Organization)) (NEPA and other departnents . 1993 No. 324); (14) ((World Bank Operational Policies and Guidelines OP/BP/GP 4.01)) and its appendix, March 1999; (15) (( World Bank Operational Policies and Guidelines OP/BP/GP 4.02 Environmental Action Plan)), January 1999; (6) (( World Bank Policies on Security Assurance)) 1  Environmental Action Plan of Yong-Wu Highway (17) ((Environmental Protection Management Regulations for Construction Project in Fujian Province)); (18) (( Environmental Impact Assessment Report for Yong 'an- Wuping Highway (Fujian-Guangdong border) (second edition) MOC Highway Research Institute)) (Feb. 2006) . 2. Major adverse impacts on the environment (1) Ecological environment (including soil erosion) The main line of the proposed highway will occupy a land area of about 26,820 mu (Chinese acre) with an average of 136 mu each kilometer. The types of occupied lands include paddy fields, non-irrigated fields, vegetable plots, forestlands, and wastelands. Construction of this highway will produce certain loss to the farming lands and agricultural economy, but will not produce remarkable change to the land utilization pattern. Subgrade excavation and earth/stone filling will produce a certain destruction to the vegetation. Small animals living and perching there will also be threatened. But through planting measures, part of vegetation areas can be restored or compensated, and the original animals may return to their original habitats. The proposed highway is situated at hilly and mountainous area, involving relatively large volumes of earth waste; a total of 5 earth borrow pits and 101 waste sites will be needed with large volume of waste works. The earth borrow pits and waste sites will destroy the vegetation, farmlands and landscape, if their locations are improperly selected, serious soil erosion will be created. The proposed highway is basically aligning in the corridor belt of the original national road G205 and intersects with it for several times. Along the route, human activities are relatively frequent, the socialization degree is relatively high. Through investigation, no wild plant species or their centered distribution with significant value are found. According to the prediction, if no single protective measure is taken, the water and soil erosion volume occurred during the construction period amounts to 295884 tons/year. Because the protection works will be designed, constructed, completed, and accepted along with the main works of the project at the same time, the actually occurred water and soil erosion volume will be far smaller than the predicted volume. In addition, the implementation of highway planting will also restore the vegetation of partial slope faces and reduce water and soil erosion. (2) Water environment If discharged casually, the sanitary sewage produced from construction campsites will have adverse impact on the environment. The life sewage volume produced from the two sides of Xiaotao service area (K25 + 700), Liancheng service area (K77 + 100), Caixi service area (K125 + 600), and Wuping service area (K171 + 000) is about 60t/d in total. The sewage of service areas produced during operation period can be used in tree planting in service areas after treated to satisfy discharge standard, also can be discharged into nearby ditches, thus causing minor impact on the environment. (3) Acoustic environment General construction noise such as the noise from transportation vehicles and roadbuilding machines will exert relatively big impact on people nearby the construction site (within 60 2  Environmental Action Plan of Yong-Wu Highway meters), especially the construct noise at night will affect their rest and sleep. According to the prediction, traffic noise during highway operation period will exert relatively big impact on Guihuyang K10 + 800, Mahong K20 + 610, Wenheng township K74+500, Beicun KIll + 270, Caoying KIll + 750, Bengkantou Klll + 900, Laocheng KI12 + 400, Tangwei K166 + 800, Laowuxia K173 + 150,Hewu K173+500 Huwei K176 + 000, Shifang village K177 + 100, Meikeng K179+750, Peishang K193 + 200, Mayangdong(Mayangdong elementary school) K120 + 100. (4) Ambient air The main environmental problems during the highway construction period are TSP and bituminous smoke pollution. According to the prediction and analysis, under many years' average wind speed, the NO2 concentrations in each road section within 30m from the road centerline are not excessive during each operation period for the recommended alignment, except the NO2 concentrations in Shanghang-Wuping section is slightly excessive within 30m from road centerline; the CO concentrations in each road section within 30m from the road centerline are not excessive. But under unfavorable meteorological conditions, excess may occur in partial section. Among the 85 sensitive locations along the proposed highway, the NO2 concentrations during the short and mid-term operation periods do not exceed class 2 limit values of ((Ambient Air Quality Standard)) (GB3095 -1996); during long-term operation period, 3 sensitive locations (Tangwei, Xizhaishang, and Shifang) have a predicted value of 0.124mg/ mi3, exceeding the allowed value by 3.3%. Under unfavorable meteorological conditions, the number of sensitive locations exceeding the allowed value will be more or the excess may be larger. Therefore, the highway's impact on the roadside ambient air is small. In case of traffic jam in the tunnel, the vehicle speed and the wind speed greatly drop down, the pollutant concentration will increase by many times, causing the NO2 concentration in the tunnel surpassing the limit value for industrial enterprise health standard, and because the pollutant remains in the bore, it will damage human body. Moreover, the soot and other particles emitted from diesel engines will greatly reduce the visibility in the tunnel, affecting traffic safety and human body health. Therefore when the tunnel length surpasses 500m, it is extremely necessary to install mechanical ventilation devices. When the tunnel length surpasses 2000m, the ventilation speed must be increased. (5) Social environment The proposed highway will occupy some lands and cultivated lands; through land transit and transformation of land utilization value, the agricultural economic loss produced by land occupation can be reduced. Immigration and resettlement organizations at municipal, county, and township level have been established to deal with the immigration and resettlement problem of this project. Because skywalk bridges, channels, and culverts for trip are reasonably set up, thus the impact on inhabitants' life convenience is not significant along the route. (6) Cultural relic and historical site According to the report submitted by cultural relic department, the proposed highway will not cause destruction to existing ground cultural relics. (7) Hazardous substance transportation risk The probability of hazardous substance transportation accident is tiny, but once occurred, its 3  Environmental Action Plan of Yong-Wu Highway consequence is very serious. The emergency plan has been formulated, training and management will be strengthened to improve emergency handling capability so as to reduce the pollution risk to a minimum. 3. Mitigation measures for environmental impacts 3.1 Design period 3.1.1 Reasonable route selection In the route selection, the design unit, the environmental assessment unit, and the construction unit have consulted and discussed many times so as to give full consideration to each environmental factors such as protection of farmlands, schools, residential quarters, and cultural relic sites, as well as flood prevention and discharge, removal quantity, city/town development plan, construction material supply and stockpile location selection on the condition of reasonable alignment and reduced construction cost; they have widely consulted with concerned experts, local governments, and people from all walks of life along the route, as a result, the present route alignment was formed. 3.1.2 Ecological restoration The planting works and the main work of the highway project will be designed and completed simultaneously. In designing, local tree, shrub, and grass species are preferred so as to restore and compensate for the vegetation. 3.1.3 Water and soil conservation Subgrade drainage and protection works have been designed, such as cutoff trench, side ditch, facing wall, slope protection, retaining wall, grit protection, and so on, which can stabilize the subgrade and can prevent and control soil erosion. 3.1.4 Water pollution Drainage works have been designed so that the pavement runoff will not directly discharge into sensitive water bodies. Canals and ponds infringed or separated by the subgrade have been reconstructed or redesigned. The service areas have designed sewage treatment so to make the sewage satisfying national discharge standard. 3.1.5 Noise impact According to the environmental assessment results, noise reduction measures are adopted in different sensitive locations during construction period such as sound barrier, removal, and soundproofing window, which have already been included into the design documents. 3.1.6 Flying dust pollution Stone quarries and mixing stations should be located 300 meters away from residential areas. Material transportation roads should be reasonably designed to evade the residential areas as far as possible and to avoid flying dust's impact on the inhabitants. 4  Environmental Action Plan of Yong-Wu Highway 3.1.7 Cultural relics preservation The Sanming Yong-Wu Highwai Company and Longyan Yong-Wu Highwai Company entrusted relevant cultural relics departments (Sanming Municipal Cultural Relic Management commission, Longyan Municipal Culture and Publishing Bureau, and Longyan Archaeological Team for Yong-Wu Highway) for carrying out cultural relics investigation within the project region. The investigation coclusion is as follows: Sanming section: there are no cultural relics units proclaimed by the governments at country, province, county (city or district) level, there are no ground relic sites with historical and artisitic value, and there is no existence of complete cultural relic system. Longyan section: there are no protected cultural relics units listed by the governments at country, province, or city level, and there are no existence of underground archaic cultural relic sites. 3.1.8 Transportation risk of hazardous substances (1) a closed and perfect drainage system has been designed, which can lead the bridge floor runoff into subgrade drainage ditches so as to prevent hazardous substances on bridge floor from leaking into the rivers. (2) In the entrances and exits of great bridges and tunnels, warning signs such as "Cautious Drive"(yellow) and "Speed limit 60km for hazardous cargo vehicles (red)" will be set up respectively so as to remind the drivers to be careful of safety and speed control. (3) At 1OOm in front of each toll station, "Attention Sign" (blue board) will be set up to remind the drivers of hazardous cargo vehicles to drive aside, to declare, and to wait for inspection voluntarily. (4) Tunnel safety design (D To set up management facilities for tunnel operation and to install relevant equipment The tunnel operation management facilities is composed of 8 systems including ventilating system, power supply and illumination system, fire-fighting system, traffic control system, urgent telephone system, closed-circuit TV system, fire warning system, and central control system. Among them, the ventilating system is composed of boaster air blower, air blower driving cabin, carbon monoxide monitor, and visibility monitor; the fire-fighting system is composed of fire hydrant case and chemical fire extinguisher; the fire warning system sets up alarm button. The tunnel fire prevention will be equipped with fire extinguishers, hydrants, and aqueous film forming foam extinguishers according to the tunnel length, and in suitable position of the portal, high-level water tank will be set up to satisfy the water volume and water pressure needed by fire facilities. In addition to the firefighting facilities, necessary fire monitoring equipment, transverse gallery, and rolling screen doors will be set up for long tunnels and extra-long tunnels. (