Air Pollution

Chinese provincial government and enterprises should stay focused on emission reduction efforts despite cooling economy and resist the temptation of spurring economy through energy-inefficient industrial projects, officials and experts said Saturday.

Beijing’s environmental authority started publishing daily readings of ozone levels in the air over the weekend, in line with China's new edition of air quality guidelines, according to the Global Times.

On the back of announcing a significant reduction in the carbon-intensity of their operations the Airport Authority Hong Kong and 40 business partners have pledged to make Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) the world's greenest. While a laudable goal this may not be enough to fend off mounting concern among the Hong Kong general public, NGOs and legislators about the environmental conditions in and around the airport, which may ultimately derail plans to add a third runway to HKIA.

Several major Chinese cities have some of the world's highest per capita carbon footprints, a World Bank warned in a new report issued on Thursday. According to a story in the China Daily, greenhouse gas emissions in Tianjin, Shanghai and Beijing far exceed those of cities such as Paris, Tokyo, London, Barcelona and Jakarta the report stated. Globally, most urban emissions come from transport, buildings and waste, but these three sectors only account for about 20 percent of China's urban emissions which are driven mainly by industry and power generation, largely because of its reliance on coal for energy.

The Chinese capital will continue to subsidize the scrappage of aging and heavy-diesel vehicles in response to concerns over the city's air pollution, an official with the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau told Xinhua on Tuesday.