GB 13457-2025Discharge standard of water pollutants for slaughter and meat processing industry (English PDF)

Foreword

This document was issued on 2 December 2025 by the the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People's Republic of China, Standardization Administration of the People's Republic of China and takes effect on 1 January 2027.

It is a GB standard without the /T suffix: compliance is mandatory in China.

The document runs to 15 pages in translation. The identification, the dates, the table of contents and the clauses reproduced on this page are taken from the standard itself.

GB 13457-2025 Discharge standard of water pollutants for slaughter and meat processing industry English, Anglais, Englisch, Inglés, えいご

Discharge standard of water pollutants for slaughter and meat processing industry

It replaces GB 13457-1992, which is superseded.

1 Scope

GB 13457-2025 is the Chinese discharge standard for water pollutants from the slaughtering and meat processing industry, effective 1 January 2026. Abattoir effluent carries blood, fat, paunch manure and a high organic and nitrogen load, and it is also the industrial wastewater with the clearest public health dimension. The standard sets the water pollutant discharge control requirements, the monitoring requirements, the specifications for the discharge outlet and the rules for implementation and supervision, and it applies to existing plants as well as to the environmental impact assessment, the treatment plant design and the completion acceptance of new ones. It replaces GB 13457-1992, a standard more than thirty years old, which is the measure of how much has changed in the sector. For a meat processor operating in China, or for an engineering contractor building or upgrading one, this is the text a discharge permit is based on.

This standard specifies the control requirements, monitoring requirements, and supervision and management requirements for water pollutant discharge from the slaughtering and meat processing industry.

This standard applies to the management of water pollutant discharge from existing pollutant discharging units in the slaughtering and meat processing industry, as well as to the environmental impact assessment of construction projects in the slaughtering and meat processing industry, the design of environmental protection facilities, the acceptance of completed environmental protection facilities, the issuance of pollutant discharge permits, and the management of water pollutant discharge after these projects are put into operation.

This standard also applies to the management of water pollutant discharge from pollutant discharging units engaged in natural casings processing, edible animal fat processing, and egg processing, as well as from centralized wastewater treatment facilities serving the slaughtering and meat processing industry.

This standard does not apply to the management of water pollutant discharge from pollutant discharging units engaged in non-edible animal fat processing and the deep processing of livestock and poultry blood and bones.

The water pollutant discharge control requirements specified in this standard apply to the direct or indirect discharge of water pollutants outside the legal boundaries by pollutant discharging units engaged in slaughtering and meat processing, natural casings processing, edible animal fat processing, egg processing, as well as by centralized wastewater treatment facilities serving the slaughtering and meat processing industry.

2 Normative References

The following documents, or the clauses cited therein, are referenced in this standard. For dated references, only the edition cited applies. For undated references, the latest edition of the referenced document (including all amendments) applies. If other documents are superseded, modified, or revised by new ones, the new documents apply.

GB 15562.1 Environmental Protection Graphic Signs — Discharge Outlet (Source)

GB/T 11893 Water Quality — Determination of Total Phosphorus — Ammonium Molybdate Spectrophotometric Method

GB/T 11901 Water Quality — Determination of Suspended Solids — Gravimetric Method

HJ 91.1 Technical Specifications for Wastewater Monitoring

HJ 195 Water Quality — Determination of Ammonia Nitrogen — Gas-phase Molecular Absorption Spectrometry

HJ 199 Water Quality — Determination of Total Nitrogen — Gas-phase Molecular Absorption Spectrometry

HJ/T 399 Water Quality — Determination of Chemical Oxygen Demand — Rapid Digestion Spectrophotometric Method

HJ 493 Water Quality — Technical Regulations on Sample Preservation and Management

HJ 494 Water Quality — Guidance on Sampling Techniques

HJ 495 Water Quality — Technical Regulations on Sampling Program Design

HJ 505 Water Quality — Determination of Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD5) after 5 Days — Dilution and Inoculation Method

HJ 536 Water Quality — Determination of Ammonia Nitrogen — Salicylic Acid Spectrophotometric Method

HJ 537 Water Quality — Determination of Ammonia Nitrogen — Distillation-Neutralization Titration Method

HJ 636 Water Quality — Determination of Total Nitrogen — Alkaline Potassium Persulfate Digestion UV Spectrophotometric Method

HJ 667 Water Quality — Determination of Total Nitrogen — Continuous Flow-Hydrochloric Naphthylethylenediamine Spectrophotometric Method

HJ 668 Water Quality — Determination of Total Nitrogen — Flow Injection-Hydrochloric Naphthylethylenediamine Spectrophotometric Method

HJ 670 Water Quality — Determination of Phosphate and Total Phosphorus — Continuous Flow-Ammonium Molybdate Spectrophotometric Method

HJ 1405 Technical Specification for Monitoring Point Setting at Pollutant Discharge Outlets of Pollutant Discharging Units

Notice on the Technical Specifications for Discharge Outlet Signboards

3 Terms and Definitions

For the purposes of this standard, the following terms and definitions apply.

3.1

slaughter and meat processing

Includes livestock and poultry slaughtering and meat product processing. Livestock and poultry slaughtering includes the slaughtering of various livestock and poultry, as well as fresh meat segmentation, freezing, and other preservation activities, but excludes commercial cold storage activities. Meat product processing refers to processing various livestock, poultry meat, and their by-products into meat products.

3.2

natural casings processing

The technological process of making casings for sausages and other encased products by specially processing healthy animal organs such as small intestines, large intestines, and bladders through scraping, degreasing, etc., and preserving parts thereof through salting or drying.

3.3

edible animal fat processing

The technological process of rendering edible lard, tallow, sheep fat, chicken fat, or duck fat from the leaf fat, meat fat, omentum, or pure adipose tissue attached to internal organs of quarantined and inspected pigs, cattle, sheep, chickens, and ducks.

3.4

egg processing

The technological process of processing poultry eggs into egg products (including cleaned eggs, liquid eggs, dried eggs, reconstituted eggs, frozen eggs, heat-coagulated eggs, etc.).

3.5

centralized wastewater treatment facilities

Wastewater treatment facilities that provide wastewater treatment services for two or more pollutant discharging units, including urban centralized wastewater treatment facilities of various scales and types, wastewater treatment facilities in industrial clusters (such as economic and technological development zones, high-tech industrial development zones, export processing zones, and other industrial parks), and other wastewater treatment facilities shared by two or more pollutant discharging units.

3.6

centralized wastewater treatment facilities for slaughter and meat processing industry

Centralized wastewater treatment facilities specifically providing wastewater treatment services for two or more pollutant discharging units engaged in slaughter and meat processing, natural casings processing, edible animal fat processing, or egg processing.

3.7

existing pollutant discharging unit

An enterprise and its production facilities engaged in slaughter and meat processing, natural casings processing, edible animal fat processing, or egg processing that were built and put into operation before the date of implementation of this standard, or for which the environmental impact assessment document has been approved, as well as centralized wastewater treatment facilities for the slaughter and meat processing industry.

3.8

new pollutant discharging unit

Construction projects for slaughter and meat processing, natural casings processing, edible animal fat processing, egg processing industries, and centralized wastewater treatment facilities for the slaughter and meat processing industry that are newly built, reconstructed, or expanded, for which the environmental impact assessment document is approved on or after the date of implementation of this standard.

3.9

direct discharge

The act of a pollutant discharging unit discharging water pollutants directly into environmental water bodies.