POLLUTION-CHINA.COM

You might have seen many Chinese wearing surgical masks in the streets to protect themselves against pollution and you probably already asked yourself: are these masks really effective against air pollution?

These masks are not suited against pollution and the main reason is simple: these masks are designed to protect others from droplets you might spread.

Quoting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services:

”Facemasks are loose-fitting, disposable masks that cover the nose and mouth. These include products labeled as surgical, dental, medical procedure, isolation, and laser masks.
Facemasks help stop droplets from being spread by the person wearing them. They also keep splashes or sprays from reaching the mouth and nose of the person wearing the facemask. They are not designed to protect you against breathing in very small particles. Facemasks should be used once and then thrown away in the trash.“

"We will do everything possible to honor the promise"
(Du Shaozhong, deputy director of the Beijing's Environmental Protection Bureau)

Beijing announced last monday some measures that will be taken against pollution to bring "green games" to the athletes this summer. The measures will officially be in effect for two months (from July 20 to Sept. 20) and will include:

• two-months halt of construction (even spray painting outdoors will be banned)
• traffic restriction to ban half of Beijing's 3.3 million vehicles during the Olympics (Aug. 8-24)
• 19 heavy polluting factories will be forced to either reduce pollution emissions by 30 percent or stop activity

Since most of Beijing's pollution is due to emissions from surrounding provinces, Du Shaozhong also mentionned that some of these measures will also take effect in five provinces and municipalities around Beijing (Tianjin, Hebei, Shanxi, Shandong and Inner Mongolia).

During the press conference, Du Shaozhong also said:

"Just tell everybody they don't have to worry."

Well, I guess athletes and tourists don't have to worry for the games period, but what about Beijingers like me who are still exposed to heavy pollution everyday?

Sources: International Herald Tribune, Aujourd'hui la Chine (article in French)

As Melanie mentionned in her comment on the previous article, it often happens that sandstorms hit East Asia (China but also Korea and Japan) during this time of the year. The "yellow dust" from the Gobi Desert is blown eastward over China and thus contributes to air pollution in major cities like Beijing, by increasing the concentration of dust and particles.

In fact, NASA just uploaded on one of its website (Earth Observatory/Natural Hazards, already mentionned in this article) an interesting satellite image showing a dust storm over East Asia that happened on March 1.

On this picture, you can clearly see the cloud of tan-colored dust passing just south from Beijing. And by checking the graph posted a few days ago, you can also see the sandstorm's impact on Beijing's air quality: a pollution peak (API of 127) appears around March 1.

You might think that even nature contributes to air pollution in China, but actually, it seems like human activities strongly increased the occurence of dust storms (from once every 31 years until 1949 to once a year since 1990).

The municipal meteorological observatory forecast about 10 days of sandy weather in the capital city this spring... (source: Xinhua)

Update (18 March 2008):
A sandstorm hits Beijing today, bringing once again pollution to an unreached level this year, with an API of 305 according to the Beijing Environmental Bureau.

Even though Beijing's "Blue Sky" days are still quite polluted, I'm pretty sure most Beijingers like me enjoyed the city's sunny and pleasant weather from the past last weeks.

However, even though weather forecast said yesterday (March 10) was a bright sunny day, unwelcome smog made it tougher to enjoy a bright blue sky in the city. As a matter of fact, yesterday, Beijing had an API of 238 (grade IV), which grants that day to be the most polluted day so far in 2008.

It is also interesting to focus on the API reported by the different monitoring stations. You probably remember that some downtown stations were powered off, being replaced by new ones in the countryside. Therefore, whereas Badaling's new monitoring station reported an API of 78 (grade II), the lucky Beijingers living in Chaoyang enjoyed an API rising up to 339 (grade V).

An API of 339 corresponds to a PM10 concentration of 451µg/m³, exceeding more than nine times the WHO air quality guidelines on PM10 (50µg/m³ for 24hr mean).