Former Changlong site, Changzhou (Foreign Languages School case)

The "former Changlong" site, in Xinbei District, grouped three chemical works: Changlong, founded in 1979 and controlled by the Shenzhen agrochemical group Noposion, Huada and Changyu. They made pesticide active ingredients and formulations, intermediates and dyes. According to former employees quoted in the press, production logs listed carbofuran, methomyl and isoprocarb, and effluent and hazardous waste were discharged outside the plant or buried. The factories were relocated in June 2011.

The site investigation found chlorobenzene, carbon tetrachloride, naphthalene and other polycyclic hydrocarbons, mercury, lead and cadmium in soil and groundwater: chlorobenzene exceeded the limit 94,799 times in groundwater and 78,899 times in soil, carbon tetrachloride 22,699 times; about 3,475 tonnes of industrial waste also remained. In March 2014 the city began the clean-up, budgeted at nearly 400 million yuan and due to finish in mid-2015; by then only half of the two planned phases had been completed.

The new campus of the Foreign Languages School, about 200 metres to the south, opened in September 2015; building had started in August 2011, before the environmental assessment was approved (March 2012). From December 2015, with excavation under way and a strong smell in the air, students reported rashes, coughs and nosebleeds. On 17 April 2016 the state broadcaster CCTV reported that 493 of 641 students examined showed abnormalities; the city acknowledged 133 out of 597. All data come from Wikipedia, in Chinese and in English.