Smog, Glorious SmogMy friend insists she doesn’t want lots of sun darkening her skin when we are out and about, but I don’t think she has too much worry about in Beijing. Sure, the sun does shine, but the sky has a perma-cloudy quality that negates the need for a parasol or sun cream…
I had heard a lot about Beijing’s famous smog before I came to live here. It probably says a lot about the lack of respect I have for my lungs that I still got on the plane happily enough, even though my classmates who had studied in Beijing were telling me things like: “I had forgotten what a blue sky looks like!” or “Living in Beijing is like smoking 70 cigarettes every day!”.
So today I’ve been reading up online to find out more about what the famous Beijing pollution might be doing to my body. On http://www.cleanair.net, I learned that satellite images taken by the European Space Agency in 2005 showed that Beijing had the world’s worst Nitrogen Dioxide pollution. The writer warns that this noxious heavy gas can cause potentially deadly lung damage and respiratory problems. http://www.theglobalist.com had more frightening facts about the Chinese environment. At the moment, there is an average of a thousand new cars on the road in Beijing every day. If China’s rate of vehicle ownership grew to match that of the USA, then that would mean there would be 600 million Chinese cars on the road. That is more than the total number of cars in the world in 2005.
It is well known that China’s economy is developing rapidly (hence the huge increase in number of cars). However, it is less widely reported that this rapid economic growth has resulted in cuts in forest cover in North and Central China by more than half since 1985. The result is that the country’s deserts are growing annually by several hundred thousand square miles. It is not just dust from construction sites that are to blame for Beijing’s summer sandstorms. The Gobi desert is actually moving closer to Beijing at a rate of about two miles a year, and is now less than 200 miles away from Beijing.
Reading this information, part of me just wants to pack my suitcase straight away. How can China sustain this kind of environment? By 2020 it is estimated that 500 000 people will die prematurely from bronchitis and similar illnesses. (Prestowitz, 2005).
All the same, I probably ought to mention here that I have actually been pleasantly surprised during my time in Beijing. A lifelong asthmatic, I assumed that wheezy coughing and spluttering was just going to be part of my Beijing experience. Yet I have not really had any problems with my chest since I got here. Moreover, I have seen the sky in Beijing, on quite a few occasions. I had even been very happy believing that my pale skin had got something of a sun tan since I got here, but this delusion has since been refuted by many.
It might be that the efforts in preparation for the Olympics are beginning to take effect. At the start of the year, Beijing’s official Olympics website announced that we could expect 245 blue sky days in 2007 due to new environmental measures. Last month, Beijing Municipal Protection Bureau conducted a four day experiment by removing a million cars from Beijing’s roads. It is reported that this caused Nitrogen Dioxide emissions to decrease by 20%. Indeed, Chinese government planners are making such an effort for the games to be an entirely flawless spectacle that they are even attempting to control the weather, according to the Wall Street Journal. Zhang Qiang, head of Beijing's Office of Weather Manipulation, told the WSJ about experiments with firing chemical-laced rockets at rain clouds, in the hope of finding a way to keep the ceremonies dry by triggering cloudbursts away from the city...
As the Olympics approach, it is certainly a very exciting time to be in China, and lots of changes are being made. Hopefully in terms of the environment these changes will be for the better. I can’t quite tell if the blue skies I have been seeing are the result of these environmental efforts or have more to do with my own rose tinted spectacles. Certainly China still has a long way to go in clearing up pollution, only time will tell if she is on the right path so far.
References:
Fong, Mei; Fowler, Geoffrey and Oster, Shai http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118642645285089491.html?mod=hpp_asia_pag... An article about Beijing’s preparation for the upcoming Olympic Games
Moore, Emma http://www.cleanairnet.org/caiasia/1412/article-70696.html An article warning about the dangers of Beijing pollution
Prestowitz, Clyde http://www.theglobalist.com/StoryId.aspx?StoryId=4692 A report on pollution in China
http://en.beijing2008.cn/goodluckbj/others/n214141227.shtml The official website of the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008
