To enhance the protection of the water environment, Tibet has set up eight different kinds of environmental testing stations, 61 water quality-monitoring stations and six water and soil conservation monitoring stations. Starting from 2006, a large-scale pollution prevention and control action in drainage areas, lasting 10 years and costing 9.24 billion, is being implemented. This action mainly aims to protect the water and air environment and dispose the solid waste harmlessly in the drainage area of the "Five rivers" (the Yarlung Zangbo, Lhasa, Nyang, Nyang Qu and Yarlung), thus ensuring that the environmental quality in the drainage areas is controlled within the set standard range for the functional area and a control system for disposing solid waste is set up to realize quantity reduction and the harmless disposal of solid waste of all kinds. The key range of the plan for pollution prevention and control on the drainage area lies in the trunk stream of the Yarlung Zangbo River and entryway sections of the "four rivers", and the river section by the cities (towns) in the drainage area of the "five rivers,"involving 32 county towns belongin to four prefectures or cities, i.e. Lhasa, Xigaze, Shannan and Nyingchi, and covering an area of some 300,000 square km.

"In order to realize the aforementioned goals, Tibet is actively promoting pollutant emission reduction. It has conducted a study on the autonomous ecological compensation and survey on soil, water and air pollution situation, and completed the formulation of the Comprehensive Working Scheme of the Tibet Autonomous Region for Energy Saving and Emission reduction in 2007. The autonomous regional government signed the target responsibility documents of control of the total emission of major pollutants during the "11th Five-Year Plan" with various prefectures(cities) respectively to ensure that the total emission of major pollutants into water and air were controlled within the State-set target. It invested 4 million Yuan in strengthening enterprise pollution abatement, and prohibiting new enterprises characterized by high-energy consumption and high pollution. In addition, local government at various levels in Tibet called out 1,600 person times to inspect 96 drinking water source sites, so as to ensure the drinking water safety.

"According to the short-term goals set by thhe plan, the rate of domestic sewage treatment up to discharge standards will reach 60 percent, the rate of industrial waste water up to discharge standards 90 percent, and the rate of industrial waste gas up to discharge standards, the rate of noise up to standard at the boundary of industrial and mining enterprises, the rate of noise up to standard at the boundary of construction sites, and the rate of domestic trash disposal will all reach 85 percent in the key cites (towns) in the drainage areas of the "Five Rivers" by 2010.

( Source: China's Tibet Facts & Figures 2008 )