‘Secret’ cell phone mast radiates fear in Fengtai community

Residents in Fengtai have forced their local property management company to promise to take down a cell phone mast yesterday, after the company wrongly claimed they had received environmental approval for the construction.

Many residents of Cuihai Mingyuan community, Fengtai district, were furious when a 20-meter-tall China Mobile mast suddenly appeared in December only 20 meters away from one residential building, and a mere 100 meters away from a kindergarten.

"We were told it was a billboard, but clearly it's a phone mast. We're very concerned about electromagnetic radiation since they lied about what they were building," said a resident surnamed Pan.

An employee surnamed Li from the property management company said the mast was built to solve the problem of "mobile signal coverage being deficient in the neighborhood," and the environmental impact assessment showed the levels of the emission of the project "perfectly met the standards."

Yet, no residents were given access to the report, and continued to vociferously protest the location of the mast.

"We don't want to be in such close proximity to the facility," said a resident surnamed Wu.

"The boundary of the kindergarten and one building are within 100 meters of the mast. I believe there must be serious radiation around it," he said.

Li said yesterday the company would cooperate with the mobile company and remove the mast next month.

An engineer, surnamed Zhao, from Beijing Zhonghuan Putian Environment Monitor Center under Beijing Bureau of Quality and Technical Supervision, does not believe residents would be in jeopardy. However, he is more concerned about the current assessment standards.

"Electromagnetic radiation declines a lot for every meter away from the mast, and should be considered very low away from the mast-top," said Zhao.

"But the standards for monitoring the emissions still follow the regulations issued in the 1980s, so we should seriously look at updating them," said Zhao.