[Chinese Mainland] Three River Basin Protection Regulations in Sichuan Take Effect Simultaneously on September 1: Legislation for the Jialing River, Lugu Lake, and Chishui River with Dual-Level Support from National Standards

Key Highlights: 2026年9月1日, multiple basin ecological regulations in Sichuan Province took effect simultaneously — the "Sichuan Province Jialing River Basin Ecological Environmental Protection Regulations," the "Sichuan Province Lugu Lake Protection Regulations," and the "Sichuan Province Chishui River Basin Protection Regulations." Among them, the Chishui River regulations and GB 47945—2026 "Discharge Standard of Water Pollutants for Chishui River Basin" form a dual-layer supporting framework of "national standards + local regulations." Also implemented in the same month were GB 4287—2026 "Discharge Standard of Water Pollutants for Textile Industry" and GB 47946—2026 Danjiangkou Reservoir Area standard.

I. "One Province, Three Rivers and Lakes": Three Water Systems, Three Sets of Rules

Sichuan launched three basin legislative items on the same day, covering vastly different water body types and encompassing almost all typical scenarios of basin governance.

• "Sichuan Province Jialing River Basin Ecological Environmental Protection Regulations" — Comprehensive basin legislation for the Sichuan section of the Jialing River, coordinating **water resources, water pollution prevention and control, and ecological restoration**, and establishing **cross-regional collaborative management and ecological compensation mechanisms**
• "Sichuan Province Lugu Lake Protection Regulations" — Special protection legislation for Lugu Lake (Sichuan area), controlling **development around the lake, tourism pollution, and pollutants entering the lake**, and protecting the plateau lake's aquatic ecology
• "Sichuan Province Chishui River Basin Protection Regulations" — Supporting **GB 47945—2026** national standard, implementing **industrial access control, collaborative governance, and ecological compensation** in the Sichuan section of the Chishui River Basin

Large rivers, plateau lakes, and industry-oriented rivers — the pollution sources, governance difficulty, and interest structures of these three water body types are completely different. Sichuan's approach of advancing them at the same time point with separately customized rules itself indicates that provincial-level basin legislation has moved past the stage of "copying superior laws."

II. Chishui River: One River, National Standards and Three Provinces' Legislation Working Simultaneously

The Chishui River is the most valuable sample for observation.

At the national standard level, GB 47945—2026 "Discharge Standard of Water Pollutants for Chishui River Basin" has been implemented since 2026年9月1日. This standard features customized control rules for the key habitats of rare and endemic fish in the upper Yangtze River and the well-known baijiu industry cluster area. It is the first basin discharge standard for the core production area of sauce-flavor baijiu, with main features including:

• Specifying discharge control requirements, monitoring requirements, and supervision and management requirements for major water pollutants of **pollutant discharge units and production facilities in key industries** within the basin
• **Dividing three types of control zones**, with differentiated control intensity set by zone
• Improving **unit product benchmark discharge volume** provisions for the **fermented alcohol and baijiu manufacturing** industries
• New enterprises shall comply from **2026年9月1日**, and existing enterprises shall comply from **2028年1月1日**

At the local legislative level, Sichuan, Guizhou, and Yunnan provinces each advance Chishui River Basin protection legislation, forming synergy with the national standard. The national standard addresses "how much to discharge and how to measure," while local regulations address "how to set industrial access, how to coordinate across provinces, and who pays for ecological compensation."

This division of "national standards set limits, local regulations set mechanisms" is precisely the most significant structural change in basin governance in recent years: standards govern technical criteria, legislation governs interest distribution.

III. Jialing River: Cross-Regional Collaboration and Ecological Compensation Are the Biggest Highlights

The Jialing River is an important tributary of the upper Yangtze River. Its basin spans Gansu, Shaanxi, Sichuan, and Chongqing. The Sichuan section is in the middle and lower reaches, receiving upstream inflow while also affecting the Chongqing exit section. This "connecting upstream and downstream" position determines that governance by one locality alone cannot solve the problem.

Two mechanism designs in the regulations deserve attention:

First, cross-regional collaborative management. Upstream and downstream areas within the basin need unified criteria for industrial access, discharge outlet setting, and monitoring section layout; otherwise, upstream "compliant discharge" may still cause downstream sections to exceed standards after accumulation. The essence of the collaborative management mechanism is upgrading "individual compliance" to "overall compliance."

Second, the ecological compensation mechanism. This is the most difficult and most critical link in basin governance — upstream areas give up some industrial development opportunities to protect the water environment, while downstream areas enjoy clean inflow. Who compensates, how much, and how to calculate have long lacked institutional answers. The regulations explicitly establish an ecological compensation mechanism, meaning this "old problem" is beginning to gain enforceable basis at the local legislative level.

IV. Lugu Lake: The Challenge of Tourism Pollution Control for Plateau Lakes

Lugu Lake spans Sichuan and Yunnan provinces and is a typical difficulty in plateau lake protection: weak water self-purification capacity, long water exchange cycle, and once eutrophication occurs, it is extremely difficult to reverse. At the same time, it is a popular tourism destination, with scattered and rapidly growing operational pollution sources such as lakeside homestays, restaurants, and campsites.

The entry point of the "Sichuan Province Lugu Lake Protection Regulations" is precisely lake-rim development control, tourism pollution treatment, and reduction of pollutants entering the lake. For plateau lakes, this type of non-point source pollution—"scattered points, small volumes, large total load"—is often harder to control than industrial point sources. Once the regulations take effect, there will be a clear legal basis for sewage collection and treatment requirements for lake-rim commercial facilities and for total pollutant load control into the lake.

V. National Standards Implemented in the Same Month: Three "Hard Target" Lines

In parallel with Sichuan's local legislation, 2026年9月1日 also saw the implementation of multiple national water pollutant discharge standards, together forming the densest round of standard updates that month:

• GB 4287—2026 "Discharge Standard of Water Pollutants for Textile Industry"—replacing **GB 4287—2012** and **GB 28936—2012**, uniformly tightening discharge limits for wastewater from subdivided processes such as cotton spinning, chemical fiber, and printing and dyeing, and regulating whole-process wastewater management in the textile industry
• GB 47946—2026 "Discharge Control Standard for Major Water Pollutants (Total Antimony, Total Molybdenum, etc.) in the Danjiangkou Reservoir Area and Upstream (Trial)"—China's **first watershed-type water pollutant discharge control standard issued in the form of a national standard**, adding limits for characteristic pollutants such as total antimony and total molybdenum to protect the water source area of the Middle Route of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project
• GB 47945—2026 "Discharge Standard of Water Pollutants for the Chishui River Basin"—unifying wastewater control indicators for industrial enterprises within the basin, in coordination with local watershed protection legislation

The three standards point to the same trend: moving from a "one-size-fits-all" approach to "differentiated" regulation. Watersheds are managed by functional zoning, industries by process segmentation, and industrial parks by type, with generic discharge standards being replaced by customized rules.

VI. Practical Impacts on Discharge Units

• First confirm the applicable scope—enterprises in the Chishui River Basin need to check both national standard limits and the industrial access requirements of the local regulations where they are located; the two do not replace each other
• Pay attention to differences in implementation timing—for GB 47945—2026, new enterprises shall comply from **2026年9月1日**, while existing enterprises shall comply from **2028年1月1日**; existing enterprises have about 16 months of upgrading window and should start process assessments as early as possible
• Update pollutant discharge permits—new requirements such as basin-specific characteristic indicators and benchmark discharge volume per unit product need to be incorporated into pollutant discharge permits in sync, avoiding the situation where "the standard has changed but the permit has not"
• Textile enterprises should conduct comprehensive comparisons—GB 4287—2026 integrates and replaces two old standards, and the limits for each subdivided process in cotton spinning, chemical fiber, and printing and dyeing all need to be recalculated
• Plan monitoring capacity in advance—characteristic pollutants (such as total antimony and total molybdenum) and differentiated limits impose new requirements on self-monitoring frequency and detection capability

From "one standard for one river" to "one set of national standards plus legislation by three provinces for one river," China's watershed governance is entering a stage of refinement. For discharge units, the most realistic change is: the compliance scope is no longer uniform nationwide, but determined by the river where you are located.

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