OREANDA-NEWS. September 26, 2013. Environmental authorities in China announced in late August that they would not approve some new refining projects and plant upgrades for the country's top two state oil firms after they failed to meet key pollution targets last year, the Guangzhou-based Southern Weekly reports.

It marks the first time that the Ministry of Environmental Protection has suspended project approvals for China National Petroleum Corporation (PetroChina) and China Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec). The move may affect the planned increase in oil production by more than three million barrels per day, according to local media reports.

"This is the harshest penalty Sinopec has ever received from the environmental protection authorities since its establishment," Sinopec chairman Fu Chengyu said at a meeting.

The announcement by the ministry came at the same time as several senior executives at CNPC and its listed arm PetroChina were removed from their posts following corruption allegations. "This is purely by coincidence," an environmental protection official said, adding that the ministry had announced plans as early as May to ensure that the companies fulfill their pollution reduction targets. The two state oil firms were also included in the ministry's list of companies failing to meet key pollution targets, with the results announced again in late August.

The two firms were give ample time to meet the emissions targets, but they did not install mandatory pollution controls at many of their facilities, the paper said. Over the past few years, the two energy giants have been fined several times for environmental protection violations, but were largely penalized for isolated cases. It has also been reported that several CNPC subsidiaries have supplied falsified emissions data to authorities.

Meanwhile, CNPC reported that four major types of pollutants emitted by its factories had been significantly reduced. However, Sinopec admitted in its 2012 report that one type of pollutant emitted by its factories had increased.

The general public is looking to the suspension as the ministry's attempt to crack down on state enterprises and ensure that they fulfill their environmental protection responsibilities.