On February 6, 2018, the Ministry of Environmental Protection of the People’s Republic of China officially published Comprehensive Directory of Environmental Protection (Version 2017), in which the rubber accelerators MBT, CBS and DCBS were listed as the products with high pollution and high environmental risk (GHW/GHF), and the antioxidants 6PPD, TMQ and IPPD were listed as the products with high environmental risk (GHF).

Gao Bo, general secretary of China Rubber Industry Association (hereinafter referred to as CRIA) Rubber Agent Specialized Committee, expressed that in the stage of seeking for opinions, CRIA had fed back the industrial opinions to relevant departments of the Ministry of Environmental Protection. However, the reason why these chemicals products were still classified as “GHW/GHF” this time was because it was almost the end of 2017 when the feedback opinions were submitted and the Ministry of Environmental Protection had no sufficient time to carry out expert argumentation on the rubber agent products.

Gao Bo specially mentioned that the Ministry of Environmental Protection expressed that the compiling of the directory of version 2018 would be initiated this year, so rubber agent still had an opportunity to remove the cap of “GHW/GHF” in 2018.

CRIA Rubber Agent Specialized Committee will prepare as soon as possible to organize the industrial experts to coordinate with the product nature argumentation and environmental risk test to strive to separate the rubber agent products from the risk of “GHW/GHF”. Meanwhile, the Specialized Committee requires the member enterprises to steadily and sustainably carry out environmental protection input, thus guaranteeing the products reach the environmental protection requirements from the source.