The Fifteenth Five-Year Plan for Building a Beautiful China sets overarching objectives for improving environmental quality, advancing green development and modernizing ecological governance for the 15th Five‑Year period (2026-2030) and targets through 2030 and 2035. It coordinates pollution control, ecosystem protection, climate action and economic restructuring. By 2030, environmental quality is to improve comprehensively and carbon peaking is to be achieved; by 2035, the Beautiful China objective is to be largely realized. The Plan enumerates sectoral measures and action programs across air, water, soil, marine, waste and new pollutants, biodiversity, and ecosystem restoration. It mandates ultra‑low emission retrofits for key industries, VOCs source control, dust and noise management, strengthened river‑lake management and wastewater infrastructure, coastal and near‑sea pollution control, soil pollution prevention and remediation, hazardous and industrial solid waste reclamation, heavy metal and new pollutant monitoring and control (including persistent organic pollutants, endocrine disruptors, antibiotics, microplastics), and biodiversity protection including protected area consolidation and species/habitat measures. On climate policy it requires advancing carbon peak actions, expanding the national carbon market, strengthening non‑CO2 greenhouse gas management, and boosting renewable energy and energy‑efficiency measures. Implementation provisions assign responsibilities to central and local governments, require monitoring, evaluation and reporting (including midterm and summary assessments), and call for legal, fiscal, technological and institutional support. The Plan emphasizes modernization of monitoring networks and smart data systems, enforcement and compliance mechanisms, standards and law development, green finance and incentive measures, and international cooperation in climate and environmental governance.
China · 2026-06-21