To remediate the soil and groundwater pollution in Taiwan, the Environmental Protection Administration has begun to levy the soil and groundwater pollution remediation fees from the manufacturers and importers of officially declared substances in accordance with the amounts manufactured and imported by such enterprises in November of 2001. The remediation fee is used in the soil and groundwater investigations and remediation projects, providing undeniable benefits to environmental protection. Since the officially declared chemical substances are mainly organic substances, the remediation fee is mainly collected from the petrochemical industry. Therefore, the industry continued to claim that the fee sources should be more fair and reasonable. In response with the industries’ requisition and to reflect the current statures of illegal dumping sites, a new version of the collection regulations was implemented in July of 2011. Other than the originally regulated substances, steel, coal, copper, nickel, and industrial wastes from the specified 13 industries were added to the regulated substances. Afterwards, the revised regulations were promulgated on December 30, 2016 and implemented on July 1, 2017. The wastes from the specified 13 industries were canceled, and changed to the designated 66 wastes items and corresponding codes. After the revision, the number of fee-payers has increased approximately from 4,000 to 7,800 and an average of 1.14 billion NT dollars of remediation fee is collected each year. A total of 15.01 billion NT dollars of remediation fees had been collected since November of 2001. This year's execution results are as follows:
(I) A total of 33,988 cases were audited for document completeness, whereas 7,876 cases were audited manually for correctness. For those cases audited for completeness, 0.4% of the cases audited manually for correctness were found incorrect by the second inspection team; showing minimal differences between the auditing team and the second inspection team. 66 cases of refund application for insurance purchases and pollution prevention projects in 2018 were filed this year. Among them, about 144 million NT dollars was refunded.
(II) 300 cases of on-site auditing was completed, which include 62 cases of refund application for pollution prevention projects in 2018. Among the 300 cases, there were 136 correct declaration cases and 164 incorrect cases required for follow-up declaration to recover the unpaid fees.
(III) Completion of the research and analysis of the electronic operation and improvement measures for the collection of remediation fees, including planning online application for cessation of the fee collection, the establishment of the business registration data interface system, the evaluation of feasibility of electronic receipts and the system function planning. In addition, the advanced functions of "Soil and Groundwater Pollution Remediation Fees Online Reporting and Inquiry System" and "Budget Expense Management System" have also been improved.
(IV) 5 consultation hotlines were set up to maintain smooth communication channels. Collecting the industry’s problems in reporting operational procedures for reference to future policy changes.
