Two sewage disposal plants started operations yesterday in rural Fengxian District.

The plants will nearly quadruple the district's sewage treatment capacity by the year's end.

It is also a major step in improving environmental protection of rural areas, city officials said.

Shanghai plans to treat 80 percent of the city's daily sewage by 2010 - up eight percent from the current level.

"The new facility will improve the district's overall water quality," Zhang Han, director of the district's sewage plant operation center, said yesterday. He said Fengxian's sewage treatment equipment are not as powerful as those in other districts. The two new facilities will increase the district's sewage treatment capacity from 40,000 tons daily to 150,000 tons each day.

With the new facility, the district will be capable of treating 40 percent of its overall sewage per day. And it hopes to reach 60 to 70 percent by 2010, he said.

Since early last year, the district and city governments spent more than 1.6 billion yuan (US$210 million) building the two sewage plants.

The district also spent another 800 million yuan to build 200 kilometers of sewage pipes to reach various residential areas, factories and farms.

Fengxian is one of the city's weakest districts in terms of sewage treatment. Most of its industrial and residential sewage is discharged into rivers and Hangzhou Bay without treatment. Shanghai plans to further control sewage discharges in more than 6,000 rural factories before 2010.

The Environmental Protection Bureau will install water quality monitoring devices in a slew of downtown and rural factories by next year.

(Source: www.shanghai.gov.cn )