Not sure I'd 100% agree, but I will say the worst days in Shanghai I can see 100 feet. Beijing, not so.

Yesterday in BJ was really bad. My friend mentioned "400". While I have no idea what that means, I'm guessing "not very good".

A friend of mine recently told me that the intern at the US Embassy who is in charge of reporting this stuff recently reported "crazy bad" (because the numbers were off the scale), but was censured soon thereafter.

i agree..im in tianjin - apparently all the pollution here is blown from bj - and yesterday was gross. it reminded me of my trips to changsha

There is a large industrial belt south of Tianjin full of belching factories. When the wind is from the south/southwest (as is often the case in the summer), that's your most likely culprit.

IMO, June-August is the worst time of year for pollution in this part of China including Beijing. The lack of big wind, heat and temperature inversions keeps the pollution trapped and intensifies it. Glad I'm not around right now.

Today's weather is great... blue skies abound!

One day does not a trend make. ;) Summer is the worst air time in Beijing, so enjoy that rare blue sky day. (using Western definition of "blue sky")

How about 2? Seriously, while the inversions have been particularly nasty this summer, the overall trend is still positive. Furthermore, I like Beijing during the summer (mostly, for reasons unrelated to weather). April, on the other hand, is my nemesis.

Is pollution in Beijing pretty bad now?
Just read about this:

BEIJING (AFP) - Air pollution in Beijing reached 'hazardous' levels on Monday, the US embassy said, as thick smog blanketed the city for the third day running, forcing the closure of highways and cancellation of flights.

The Chinese capital is one of the most polluted cities in the world, mainly due to its growing energy consumption - much of which is still fuelled by coal-fired power stations - and the high number of cars on the road.

A 'hazardous' rating by the US embassy, whose evaluation of the city's air quality often differs markedly from the official Chinese rating, is the worst on a six-point scale and indicates the whole population is likely to be affected.

The embassy has rated Beijing's air quality as hazardous on several occasions this month. On Oct 9, the reading was listed as 'beyond index', meaning it went above measurable levels.

I was trying to convince myself that the stuff outside is fog, but yeah it's pretty dense to the extent that noon was reminiscent of dusk today.

It is nasty. I stayed in all of Sunday because the air (if you can still call it air) looked gross and as I am still recovering from a cough didn't want it to get worse. I thought it looked worse yesterday compared to today, but then my office is on a much higher floor with unobstructed view so I think it only appears better since I think I can see 'further'.

Yesterday definitely seemed worse than today -- we had to go to east BJ and I kept thinking: yep, we're all smoking a full pack of cigs sitting in this cab!

It's going to rain later this week which should clear things up. However, our road is currently being dug up and is a massive dust heap -- so not looking forward to the quagmire.

tb

Sounds like the same air quality I experienced during my 4 days in Beijing, Oct. 8-12, while visiting. By the end of the day my eyes were stinging. It led to a cold/allergy that I had for the next week. I spent most of the vacation on drugs-pseudoephedrine and sinus meds. Once we left Beijing the air quality in the other cities was fine.

It's worse, believe it or not. At least it was still a normal grey smog - I recall a trip to Beijing about 7-8yrs ago where the colour of the smog looked a sickly dull yellow. Yuck.

short BBC vid
 

Here is a link to a short BBC video on the recent pollution/smog. Yep, it was pretty bad!

tb

link

There was an article in the WSJ yesterday talking about wealthy Chinese wanting to emigrate out of China. One of the top 3 reasons cited was the level of pollution in China.

"Many Chinese who have profited most from the country's growth also express increasing concerns in private about social issues such as China's one-child policy, food safety, pollution, corruption, poor schooling, and a weak legal system."

Here's the link to the entire article. I don't know if you can access without being a subscriber:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...Tabs%3Darticle

An unstated, but obvious, reason is that much of that was not properly taxed.... or, worse yet, simply stolen (in one way or another).

But, whatever the source, a cottage industry has developed during the course of the past several years... help them get long term visas (which convert into green cards), and make it easier for their kids to attend Harvard --> nice value proposition for, otherwise boring, investment products.

By in large, the bulk of them spend most of their time in China (where they can continue to amass wealth), but they "live" in Palo Alto.

The Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau was interviewed by the Chinese press, and claimed the difference between its "light pollution" vs U.S embassy's "hazardous" rating is because the local rating does not measure particles less than 2.5 mm, which is the more harmful than the larger particles that they do measure. Regarding particles less than 2.5mm, they said they have the ability to measure it, and have the data, but they cannot make them public. (probably will come to the same result as U.S embassy's)

Down south here, same thing, location depends on wealth

lots of money: Bel Air, Holmby Hills, Beverly Hills
lot of money: San Marino
money: Arcadia, Bradbury, Diamond Bar, Walnut


The San Gabriel Valley has the largest concentration of Chinese American communities in the United States. Eight of the ten cities in the United States with the largest proportion of Chinese Americans are located in the San Gabriel Valley. Communities with a high percentage of Asian Americans include Alhambra, Arcadia, Diamond Bar, Hacienda Heights, Monterey Park, Rosemead, Rowland Heights, San Gabriel, San Marino, Temple City and Walnut. According to a 2004 report by the Asian-Pacific American Legal Center, the cities of Walnut, San Gabriel, San Marino, Rosemead and Monterey Park contain an Asian American majority.

Govt finally admits Beijing is heavily polluted
 

Exposure to smog is severe hazard

In Beijing, the lung cancer rate has increased by 60 percent during the past decade, even though the smoking rate during the period has not seen an apparent increase, said Mao Yu, deputy director of the Beijing Health Bureau

Zhong Nanshan, a respiratory expert and academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering said that without intervention, PM2.5, a major cause of choking smog, would replace smoking tobacco as the top risk factor for lung cancer.

http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2...t_14216543.htm

True, but only about 2-3000 individuals out of the hundreds of thousands of millionares in China went down this path. Even if you say they chose other western countries you maybe have 1-5% of the wealthy doing this. Hardly a majority.
And the US has one of the lowest thresholds for investment to get this investment visa - 500K and 10 jobs. Buying a McDonald's franchise would easilly cover that. So the actual % is probably around 1%.


I think this has more to do with the kids education, and having an easy out in case they ever decide things really do get bad enough. Polution is just an easy excuse since as others have pointed out, most still continue to reside in China since that's where their gunxi gives them business.

That's the main reason.... US education.
Instead of 500K EB5 can buy into the birthing tourism scheme
for ~30K and get the kid US citizenship which saves a lot
on education.

Not that any admission will change anyone's minds.

At least not the patients at Beijing Cancer Hospital.

Yep, the pollution in BJ is bad, no doubts about it. But e.g. I read recently that if one buys an electric car, one can buy it outside the lottery system now in place....not terribly practical or affordable right now, but maybe in a few years.

Exploding batteries or no, I would love a chevvy volt (or equivalent, if they existed), but I fear the price is completely unaffordable.

tb

Chevy Volts priced at 78k USD in China. GM is offering buy back due to dangerous battery issues. Find a 2000-2006 Honda Insight avg mpg high 60s can hipermile to avg high 90s mpg. Haven' t seen one in China, though

What's attractive about the volt is that it's not a hybrid: it's completely electric (100%) on short journeys, typical of the capital (at least in distance if not time). That should drastically reduce pollution, even compared with a top hybrid.

tb

Well sadly, I'm sure there are more 20 year old rich Chinese kids buying Ferrari's than Volts...

Maybe a Tesla for the rich kids , not as sexy as a Lambo or Ferrari, but doesn' t look like grandpa's Volt.

I just came back to BJ this evening, and within minutes of touchdown my eyes started to hurt. Upon disembarking, the air had this forest fire smell to it, and was thick as pea soup. Really bad.

There is a coalfired boiler at PEK, they are working on reducing its emissions
now.

Bejing Capital
Airport Coal Fired Boiler

The US government (and, if you don't believe them, the average owner of the Honda Insight) would beg to differ. They say 41 mpg average. Willing to bet hypermiling doesn't get it more than 20%-30% higher.

http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Power...ht&srchtyp=ymm

Buy it now, Tesla will only last as long as Elon Musk can find idealists with cash (like the US Gov't). His product does not have a viable long term business case. And good luck making a warranty claim in 3 years when they're out of business and the technology isn't taken up by anyone.

I'm not overly thrilled about it, but the Volt's the only real game in town.

And now for something on topic:

I've lived here in Shanghai for just over a year. Granted, I have been out of the country a bit traveling, but I've only seen blue sky exactly twice (once for 1 day, once for 2 days) which coincided with massive tropical depressions / storm systems far offshore (most likely sucking the pollutants out to sea - there's a unpleasant thought, take local seafood off the shopping list!).

I live in a highrise in Lujiazui literally on the east side of the river. Many, many days, I can't make out the bund which is on the opposite side of the river. It's not a wide river.

Another example I had is going up to the top of any of the tall buildings here (Pearl Tower or Shanghai Financial Center for example) - your view is always limited by pollution, not by range of sight.

Additionally - and not sure if this is a true impact or not, but it's at least anecdotal - locals here are firework CRAZY. Every couple days there's a 4th of July outside.

*Every* day following a 4th of July is massively "smoggy", which makes sense given the materials used in construction of the fireworks. Imagine those fireworks aren't doing wonders for the environment either.

I'm excited to be able to wrap up my tour of duty here soon and go somewhere less polluted.

That said, other than pollution, I love it here (though I can't recommend it as a Chinese citizen, only a foreigner -- being a citizen would probably suck).

The scales vary massively by country. Some countries believe X is bad, others believe (or, perhaps more appropriately, want their citizenry to believe) Y. Without a doubt though, the more open western nations are more honest about giving their air a "crappy" rating than the more closed eastern ones.

Start here (though as with any wiki, take it with a grain of salt):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_quality

SH > BJ ? :p

Your referencing the Insight 2

Insight 1 was 2000 -2006

119 mpg over 1361 miles

1561 miles on one tank 13.5 gallons

Volt does not compare to the Insight 1.

At 2pm today:


Then 5 hours later:

I lack words to describe what "437" air smells like, but those of you who aren't in "the Capital" this evening should count your blessings. Ironically, traffic was abnormally light today.

Ugh. Just about to head out of the office, I hope it's better now.

They lacked words to describe when its >500...so they briefly labeled it "Crazy Bad".

http://blog.strategy4china.com/wp-co...01120BJair.jpg

By 9p, the qualitative rating dropped to "unhealthy" (very good by local standards); perhaps it pays to work late.

01-23-2012; 02:00; PM2.5; 972.0; 500; Beyond Index // Ozone; 0.0; 0; No Reading