Hundreds of residents protest the construction of the LCD factory at Nanshan Science and Technology Park in Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province on Saturday, January 19, 2013. [Photo: sz.people.com.cn]

A factory to assemble LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) under construction in the Nanshan district of Shenzhen, Guangdong Province has been asked to suspend construction recently because about 10,000 residents living in the area are questioning the environmental impact.

The project started half a year ago and is not complete yet. It is surrounded by residential areas, kindergartens and hospitals and only 18 meters far away from a residential quarter called Keyuan Huayuan.

"We residents of the quarter didn't know the plan was for a LCD factory instead of an office building until the end of December last year," a resident surnamed Liu complained.

An environment impact assessment by Shenzhen Academy of Environmental Sciences in 2009 says that the environmental impact of the LCD project will do no harm to the residents.

Some have questioned the validity of the report. A woman surnamed Li is among those who said, "Gas monitoring points set at Shenzhen University and Tsinghua High-Tech Park are far from the construction site. The data could not reflect the real exhaust emissions."

"If the factory strictly disposes of the pollutants according to the national standard, it will not harm residents' health," one expert said, adding that "residents could be entitled to routine reports on the pollutant discharge" if the factory begins operations.