Online Filing and Inquiry System for Water Pollution Control Fees.- Ministry of Environment

The filing of documents and payment of the collection of the water pollution control fees of H2 2024 (July-December) begins from January 1, 2025, to February 3, 2025 (extended due to January 31 is a Chinese New Year). Payers shall proceed with the filing and payment online within the specified time period.

The payment period of the water pollution control fees of 2024 Phase I (January to June 2024) expired on June 30, 2024. A total of 10,639 entities in Taiwan are listed under the collection of water pollution control fees for this phase. As of the mid of April, 10,620 entities have completed the payment, with a completion rate of 99.8%. However, there are still a few enterprises and sewage systems in industrial zones that have not paid fees.

Enterprises or sewage systems that violate regulations determined pursuant to Article 44 of the Water Pollution Control Act by failure to pay fees by the deadline shall pay, in addition to said fees, interest that shall accrue daily on the day of the payment deadline. In case the enterprises or sewage systems still fail to make payments 90 days after the payment deadline, they shall be fined NT$6,000 to NT$300,000, in addition to canceling the preference quota. For your best interests, the sewage systems of enterprises in industrial zones shall complete the payment online as soon as possible.

On September 18, 2024, the Ministry of Envitonment issued an official announcement (Doc. No. 1131060806) to notify that Cambridge Engineering Consultants, Inc. has been officially designated to serve as the official unit for the handing of acceptance, notification, review, verification, confirmation, auditing, inventory of the payers and data management for the collection of the water pollution control fees from  September 18, 2024, to July 31, 2025.

Official Announcement by Ministry of Envitonment

Issuance Date:  September 18, 2024

Doc. No.1131060806

Subject: It is hereby officially announced by the Ministry that Cambridge Engineering Consultants, Inc. has been officially designated to serve as the official unit for the handing of acceptance, notification, review, verification, confirmation, auditing, inventory of the payers, and data management for the collection of the water pollution control fees until July 31, 2025.

Legal Basis:

Article 3 of Guidelines for Collection of the Water Pollution Control Fees

Paragraph 2 of Article 16 of    Administrative Procedure Act

Attachment: Doc. No. 1131060806 (with the content as presented above)

The filing of documents and payment of the collection of the water pollution control fees of H1 2024 (January-June) begins from July 1, 2024, to July  31, 2024. Payers shall proceed with the filing and payment online within the specified time period.

Pollution removal is the responsibility of the polluters. If the polluters do not dispose of the pollutants generated by themselves and instead discharge them into the environment, the internal costs which shall be borne by themselves have will become the external costs borne by the general public.The pollutants discharged into the environment will consume a considerable amount of environmental resources, and more social costs if intending to remove them. The collection of the Water Pollution Control Fees could adopt the economic incentives to encourage the polluters to mitigate pollution discharge, while the special funds composed of the collected fee could be dedicated to improvement work for water bodies of rivers to improve the overall quality of water bodies in the environment.

According to Article 11 of the Water Pollution Control Act, the central competent authority shall collect water pollution control fees from enterprises and sewage systems (excluding public sewage systems and community sewage systems) that discharge wastewater or sewage into surface water bodies based on their discharge water quality and water volume or based on their discharge water quality and water volume as determined through a calculation method designated by the central competent authority.

According to Article 11 of the Water Pollution Control Act Enterprises and sewage systems (excluding public sewage systems and community sewage systems) discharge wastewater or sewage into surface water bodies.

The collected fees will be specifically earmarked for activities and projects for pollution remediation, water quality monitoring, water quality improvement, treatment facility construction, research and development, and public sewage system construction, and other water pollution prevention and control works.

1. Calculation Formula:Fee Amount =Σ[ (Rate×Quality of the Water Discharged) i × Volume of the Water Discharged], where

“i” refers to the collectible items including chemical oxygen demand (COD), suspended solids, lead, nickel, copper, the total quantity of mercury, cadmium, the total quantity of chromium, arsenic, and cyanide.

Quality of the Water Discharged:The quality shall be calculated by one of the following methods:

1. Calculated based on 90% of the maximum limit of the industry concerned or the Marine Discharge Pipe Effluent Standards.
2. Calculated based on the maximum value of the periodic inspection and filed materials in the current term of document filing and fee payment.
3. For those who do not need to file for regular inspection according to relevant regulations, the water quality test value may be adopted for the calculation.
4. For those who have established automatic water quality monitoring facilities in accordance with relevant regulations, the data obtained from the automatic monitoring transmitted during the payment period may be adopted for the calculation. The water quality calculation method is as follows:

1. Quality of the Water Discharged＝∑( Ci×Qi)/(∑ Qi), where.
2.  Ci means the arithmetic average value of the daily water quality of each collectible item in the current collection phase.   
3.  Qi means the cumulative value of daily discharged water in the current collection phase.

 5.Other calculation methods approved by the Central Competent Authority.

1. Calculated based on 90% of the daily approved discharged volume registered in the water pollution control permit (document).
2. Calculated based on the total discharged water volume of the periodic inspection and filed materials in the current term of document filing and fee payment.
3. For those who have established automatic water quality monitoring facilities in accordance with relevant regulations, the data obtained from the automatic monitoring transmitted during the payment period may be adopted for the calculation of the discharged water volume.
4. For those who do not need to file for regular inspection according to relevant regulations, the following methods for the calculation of the volume of the water discharged shall be adopted:

• Calculate based on the volume of water discharged measured by the cumulative flow measurement facilities. 
• For the animal husbandry, it shall be calculated based on the actual amount of wastewater generated in the current period. For the swine industry, it shall be calculated based on 20 liters of wastewater per pig per day.
•  Calculation by the measurement facilities or measurement methods approved by the municipal, county (city) competent authorities.

 e.Other calculation methods approved by the Central Competent Authority.

2.The calculation method for the fee for flue-gas desulfurization wastewater using seawater     payable by the coal-fired power facilities is:

• The calculation of the fee for “the total quantity of mercury” is determined in the same manner for the enterprises and sewage systems.
• The payable fee of sulfur oxides = the volume of sulfur oxides discharged from the flue gas desulfurization wastewater × the rate. Among them, the volume of sulfur oxides = the sulfur oxides emitted into the air ÷ (100%-treatment efficiency) × treatment efficiency.

In principles, enterprises and or sewage systems file the documents and pay the water pollution control fees of July to December of the previous fiscal year prior to January 31 of each current fiscal year, and shall prior to July 31 of each fiscal year, file the documents and pay the water pollution control fees of January to June of the same fiscal year.