The hazardous smog enveloping Beijing highlights the urgency for a deal at the Paris summit to cope with climate change, China on Tuesday said as it acknowledged that the recurring smog could be due to its rapid economic growth.
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A grey soupy haze subsumed Beijing’s unique landmarks, convenience stores sold air-filtering masks at brisk rates and health-food stores promoted pear juice as a traditional Chinese tonic for the lungs.
China’s capital issued its first ever “red alert”, the highest of four-colour warning system for pollution, late on Monday as the city government predicted that Beijing would be shrouded in heavy smog for three days starting from the following morning.
According to the Beijing Municipal Environmental Monitoring Center, the heavy smog will remain until Thursday.
This prompted the government to close down schools, halt any outdoor construction activities, and ban half the cars off the streets (cars with odd and even license plates will be allowed alternatively) until Thursday, December 10.
Measurements of PM2.5, the harmful microscopic particles in smog, are above 300, according to the real-time air quality monitor at the USA embassy in Beijing. They included trips to Tangshan, three hours from Beijing, or as far away as Indonesia.
“Before, they were more or less somewhat reluctant to acknowledge the problem”.
Foreign companies trying to build their businesses in China face problems recruiting senior people from overseas because of pollution concerns.
“Industrial plants blacklisted under the red alert would be shut down”. Environmental group Greenpeace called it “a welcome sign of a different attitude from the Beijing government”. The World Health Organisation deems anything over 25 micrograms as unsafe.
Luo Jiangning, 15, a second-year middle school student, said: “I like Beijing and it’s a very dynamic and convenient city”. A study led by atmospheric chemist Jos Lelieveld, of Germany’s Max Planck Institute, published this year in Nature magazine, estimated that 1.4 million people each year die prematurely because of pollution in China.
Schoolchildren in Beijing stayed home and commuters exchanged their cars for public transportation as the Chinese capital’s first-ever red alert for pollution took effect.
Some people in Beijing tried to dodge the restrictions.
Even so, Channel NewsAsia reported on Tuesday than many residents were ignoring warnings and going about their regular business.
“I feel like I’m engaged in chemical warfare”, one commuter said on social media.
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In 2013, a Dutch artist and designer Daan Roosegaarde came up with an electro-magnetic device that would pull airborne smog particles to the ground, creating columns of fresh air.
