In the report to MONRE about the environmental Protection project in Dong Nai river basin in HCMC until 2020, HCMC People’s Committee revealed the construction of three wastewater treatment plants. They include Binh Hung plant at the first stage with the capacity of 143,000 cubic meter a day, Binh Hung Hoa plant with the capacity of 30,000 cubic meter a day and Tham Luong- Ben Cat plant in the trial run with the capacity of 131,000 cubic meter a day.
Together with the waste water of approximately 200,000 cubic meter a day from daily activities in new residential areas, commercial centers and apartments, the total wastewater discharged into the environment is 370,000 cubic meter a day.
It is scheduled that by 2020, Tham Luong – Ben Cat plant will be officially operational and the city will upgrade Binh Hung plant with the capacity of 469,000 cubic meter a day and Nhieu Loc- Thi Nghe plant with 480.000 cubic meter a day.
Regarding industrial wastewater, HCMC has had 4,835 industrial factories including 3,035 factories outside industrial zones; 1,300 in 17 export processing zones, industrial zones, hi-tech park and 2 industrial groups by August 2019.
Of which, 4,200 have installed the wastewater treatment system under the national standard QCVN 40:2011/BTNMT, making up 96 percent. The ones without wastewater treatment system are relatively old and small units located in residence quarters.
Until August 2019, most of the 121 infirmaries in HCMC have had their own wastewater treatment system in accordance with national standard 28:2010/VTNMT, accounting for nearly 99 percent. Blood Transfusion Hematology Hospital and Binh Tan District General Hospital are upgrading their wastewater treatment systems.
Regarding investment in pollution treatment in the Dong Nai river basin in HCMC to reduce the proportion of buried waste to 50 percent by 2020 and 20 percent by 2025, the city has upgraded three waste-to-energy plants with the total capacity of 6,000 tons a day. In addtion, it has promoted construction progress of the Tasco solid waste treatment plant with the capacity of 500 tons a day and a waste-to-power plant using thermal plasma technology proposed by Trisun Green Energy Co.
The HCMC Department of Natural Resources and Environment also planned to supervise and prevent illicit sand exploitation in rivers Sai Gon, Dong Nai, Dong Tranh and Can Gio.
The city also petitioned the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environtment to have measures to control waste discharge into rivers and penalties on violators of environment regulations.
In 2019, the HCMC Department of Natural Resources and Environment has set up seven compliance inspection teams to perform routine investigations of 131 enterprises locating in Dong Nai river basin to assure that all companies are compliant with important environmental laws.
The city People’s Committee and relevant agencies have imposed penalties on 44 violating companies collecting fines of VND5.81 billion. Environment police in HCMC also paid visits to 235 food businesses collecting fines of nearly VND10 billion.
