| Beijing's effort to clean up its air has achieved obvious
results, as the average quality of air has been good or excellent
for about half of the days so far this year.
Zhao Yixin, director of the Municipal Environmental Protection
Administration of Beijing, told a press conference on Wednesday
that by October 20 this year, 142 days had reported good or excellent
air, 53 days more than in the same period of last year.
"The sky has become blue again in Beijing," said an elder
citizen who has lived in the city for more than 40 years.
In order to let the citizens enjoy better air quality and a blue
sky, the city has adopted 25 special measures to curb air pollution
since April this year.
Zhao said that these measures include curbing industrial pollution,
improving the makeup of fuels used in the city and limiting waste
gas emissions from automobiles.
According to the latest official statistics, 99.2 percent of the
5,010 industrial enterprises in the city have met the strict standards
of waste gas emissions. Twenty-five polluting enterprises that failed
to meet the municipal standards were closed in May.
Clean fuels such as natural gas, synthetic coal gas and liquefied
petroleum gas (LPG) have gradually become major fuels for Beijing
citizens. Beijing is expected to become the largest consumer of
natural gas in the country by using one billion cubic meters of
natural gas by the end of this year.
The city is also replacing the usage of lignite coal with low-sulfur
coal. It is expected to consume 5.5 million tons of coal with low
sulfur content this year.
In order to reduce car emissions, the city has adopted the strictest
emission standards for automobiles in the country. So far, more
than 179,000 automobiles have been renovated to meet the emission
standards. More than 82 percent of the vehicles running on the streets
of Beijing have reached the municipal standards for gas emissions.
According to Zhao, Beijing will continue to invest some 20 billion
yuan (US$ 2.5 billion) in air pollution control projects over the
next three years.
(People's Daily 10/25/2000)
|
