Seeing no evil (or anything else) in Beijing

BEIJING -- From my hotel window Saturday morning, the sun was trying to rise above the Bird's Nest Olympic Stadium.

It wasn't worth the effort.

The sun's rays could not spread through the dismal gray air, a haze that blurred the outlines of the gigantic stadium, even though it was barely 400 yards away.

Any bird that tried to cover that distance might have collapsed from respiratory failure.

After almost a week's worth of the toughest anti-pollution measures the city ever has implemented, two of the past six days had poor air quality as measured by the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau.

And, as expected given the way the air looked this (Saturday) morning, it was 3-7. In fact, the reporting period from Friday noon to Saturday showed the worst air of the three days.

Not to worry, said Du Shaozhong, deputy director of the environmental protection bureau, who advised skeptical reporters at a Saturday news conference not to believe what they saw. (Or, in this case, what they couldn't see.)

"The very notion of air quality should be equated by data instead of by photos,'' Du said in answer to my question about the atmospheric conditions Saturday.

Du was referring to some recent pictures on a BBC website.

I was talking about what I could see with my own eyes.

Maybe I was losing something in the simultaneous translation. So I turned for help to the official news release handed out before the press conference. This is what it said:

"However, because of abundant precipitation, higher humidity in the air and poor visibility, the general public can sense the air quality poor and inconsistent with actual air quality condition."

Actually, despite printed English and simultaneous translation as murky as the air, I think the answer is that a gloomy pall is hanging over Beijing because there is no wind or rain to remove it.

The point is that the pall includes enough noxious junk for the city to have reported that the air from midday Wednesday to midday Friday fell into the category of "unhealthy for sensitive groups.'' And Beijing considers air unhealthy only at a level double what the World Health Organization recommends.

Like athletes exerting themselves in the Olympics that open Aug. 8?

"We can guarantee good air quality during the games to provide a good environment for the athletes," Du said. "During the Games, no substandard days or very few substandard days will be experienced.''

Du's optimism comes from the statistics he recited to confirm the improvement in Beijing's air over the past decade. He admitted that 30% of days still do not meet good air standards.

"The air quality in Beijing has room for further improvement, that's for sure,'' Du said.

See for yourself.

-- Philip Hersh

Photo: On Friday, a heavy haze of smog hung over Beijing. And this is with new traffic regulations aimed at reducing the number of vehicles on the roads by more than half. Credit: Diego Azubel / EPA

Comments

[da]

Judging by this, Seattle probably is worst city where the sun will not rise for 300 days of the year...Also for LA coast, when the marine layer moves in, I cannot see clearly accross from the street..

I cannot judge how the air is in Beijing, but I think neither can the reporter himself just by "looking" sometimes. Better cite some numbers from scientific measurement.

[jada]

Phillip Hersh is there, he can see and feel the smog. He has access to the city air quality reports. Why doubt him? Anyone who's lived in smog knows that when it's as thick as shown in this photo, your eyes will sting and breathing becomes more difficult. To exercise in this is madness. After 30 minutes of hard exercise it becomes hard to take more than half a breath and your lungs hurt. I feel so sorry for the athletes. If the smog is this bad during competition this will be a PR nightmare for China.

[anonymous]

Believe it or not - this air quality will put our Chinese athletes at the most advantages position to get as many medals as possible. Foreign athletes, due to their relatively less exposure to this kind of bad air quality, simply cannot compete well. However, do not blame Chinese, blame IOC if you have to blame someone.

[tonyE]

Hmm.. maybe the Chinese will lose their carbon dioxide exemption as a "developing country" because of this? Do you think Al Gore will prompt a boycott of these Olympics and write another book?

After all, that pollution is simply awful. In LA, smog is also fog and pollution. The LA Basin has always had issues with air circulation since the first padres came over here and observed the smoke for the native indian's fires hung around in the air for too long. So, I just can't believe anyone would have worse smog than Pasadena during a hot summer day. Why can't the Chinese address their much worse problem?

Jeez...

[Trish Hunt]

How funny to see that the Chinese Internet Blog Police Division has found this website. They are scared of the pollution because their government is so weak that it is unable to remove this problem, unlike the easy removal of political dissidents.

However there is now a solution to this problem. Make it the same for everyone by making the pollution so bad that soon the whole world will be enveloped in it! Then no one can complain of the Chinese skies being permanently grey while everywhere else it's blue.