The sewage treatment plants that we operate are all licensed under the Water Pollution Control Ordinance, and some have additional control under the Environmental Impact Assessment Ordinance. Each month, self-monitoring results of the performance of the sewage treatment works are provided to the Environmental Protection Department for compliance check. In 2007 the number of non-compliance case reduced to only one in a small scale outlying sewage treatment plant, and the problem was rectified immediately.

In our construction sites, a contractor was convicted of two environmental offences in 2007. One related to the discharges of muddy water and the other one related to construction dust. In addition, there were six environmental offences spotted in other construction sites. Three of them were related to compliance of requirement of opening a billing account under the Construction Waste Disposal Charging Scheme. We noticed that there was room for improvement in environmental compliance and had initiated preventive and corrective measures under our Environmental Management System.

To promote responsible behaviour at our construction sites, DSD continued to operate the “Construction Sites Housekeeping Award Scheme” in 2007. All contracts that had an active construction period of 6 months or more within the assessment period (from January to October, 2007) were included in the Scheme. Each construction site was visited four times by senior professional staff or chief engineer for assessment. The contractors and the consultants/in-house site supervisory staff engaged in the same contract had been working as a team in upholding their effort to keep DSD's sites clean, tidy, hygienic and environmentally friendly.