Beijing 'failing pollution test'

by Sanjay Jha | July 8, 2008 at 04:26 am | 264 views | 3 comments

This report from BBC will bring blow to Chinese efforts to promote Beijing as an International city.

Just a month before the start of the Beijing Olympics, the city is still failing to meet international air quality standards, the BBC has found.

When Beijing bid for the Olympics in 2001, it said its air would meet World Health Organization (WHO) standards.

The BBC put this to the test using a hand-held detector to test for airborne particles known as PM10.

We found that the city's air failed to meet the WHO's air quality guidelines for PM10 on six days out of seven.

These particles are caused by traffic, construction work and factory emissions. They are responsible for much of this city's pollution.

On one of these days, the pollution reading was seven times over the WHO's air quality guideline.

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alexpenev

at 03:19 on July 10th, 2008

I was in Beijing 2 months ago. My hotel was in the Olympic Village, very close to the stadium. The photo used in this article was taken in the vicinity.

Yes, the air was as bad as it looks. I live in a fairly large urban centre myself, and the amount of trees and parks Beijing had compared to Sydney is minimal. However, I saw many trees being planted in the areas close to the Olympic sites. No doubt the effort has continued since I was there. It's also likely that they will slow traffic during the Games, perhaps applying an odd/even number plate rule on alternating days. There is some hope.