Environmental laboratory
China’s new Ecological and Environmental Code brings chemical-substance risk management and environmental monitoring into a consolidated legal framework, with stronger requirements for data quality and new chemical substance registration.
China’s new Ecological and Environmental Code comes into force on 15 August 2026, replacing and consolidating provisions from a range of existing environmental laws.
Passed by the National People’s Congress in March, the Code contains 1,242 articles covering environmental governance, pollution control, ecological protection, green and low-carbon development and legal responsibilities. Ten existing environmental laws are repealed when the Code takes effect.
For laboratories and environmental monitoring providers, one of the more significant aspects is the way the Code formalises monitoring, data quality and chemical-substance risk management within the same framework.
The Code establishes a national environmental monitoring system and requires monitoring facilities and equipment to comply with relevant laws, regulations and national standards.
It also places explicit responsibility on environmental monitoring institutions and organisations with statutory monitoring duties for the authenticity, accuracy and completeness of monitoring data. Manipulating sampling, replacing samples, changing monitoring conditions or falsifying monitoring records is prohibited.
For organisations carrying out routine environmental analysis, this reinforces the importance of QA/QC, equipment suitability, documented procedures and traceable records.
The Code also requires operators subject to pollution permitting to conduct self-monitoring, maintain records and retain original monitoring records and management ledgers for at least five years. Operators under key pollution-permit management must install, operate and maintain automatic pollutant monitoring equipment and connect it to the relevant environmental authority’s monitoring system.
The Code creates a dedicated section for chemical-substance pollution risk control.
It states that the production, import, storage, transport, sale, use and disposal of chemical substances must comply with national requirements designed to prevent environmental pollution and protect public health.
It also establishes a system for investigating information on chemical substances. Companies producing, importing or selling chemicals, or using chemicals to manufacture products, may be required to provide information including physical and chemical properties, quantities, uses, hazard characteristics and emissions.
That creates a potentially important connection between chemical management and environmental data.
The Code also establishes a new chemical substance environmental management registration system. Companies and institutions must apply for registration before manufacturing or importing a new chemical substance.
The legislation prohibits manufacturing or importing new chemical substances without the required registration certificate, or outside the conditions attached to that certificate. It also prohibits the use of unregistered new chemical substances by companies producing products.
The enforcement framework is also being strengthened.
Analysis of the new Code indicates that violations involving new chemical substances can attract fines of up to ¥2 million, alongside measures including production restrictions, suspension, certificate revocation or closure in serious cases.
Meanwhile, the revised draft of China’s Measures for the Environmental Management Registration of New Chemical Substances, published for consultation in June, proposes further changes to registration categories, applicant eligibility, exemptions, polymer management and supply-chain responsibilities.
The supporting regulatory framework therefore remains important. The Code establishes the legal foundation, while detailed administrative requirements are still being developed.
For laboratories supporting chemical manufacturers, importers and industrial operators, the immediate issue is not simply learning the new legislation.
It is understanding which analytical information may become relevant to regulatory decisions and whether existing data systems can support it.
That includes maintaining traceable records, demonstrating the quality of monitoring data and ensuring that analytical results can be linked to the relevant substance, process or emission source.
The Code also points towards greater integration between environmental monitoring and chemical management. Monitoring is not simply about demonstrating that an emission is below a limit. Increasingly, the data may form part of a wider assessment of chemical risks, production activities and supply-chain responsibilities.
China’s new environmental code therefore represents more than a consolidation exercise for environmental lawyers. For laboratories and monitoring providers, it strengthens the connection between measurement quality, regulatory evidence and chemical-substance compliance.
IET Guide 2026
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