Move gives legal grounds for more anti-pollution action
Beijing is considering a draft regulation to list smog as a meteorological disaster and study the feasibility of various solutions for the city's chronic air pollution, including congestion charges for road users and the construction of a series of air corridors throughout the city.
The Standing Committee of Beijing's Municipal People's Congress on Thursday reviewed a draft regulation on the prevention of and response to meteorological disasters, which suggested that smog be termed a meteorological disaster, news site chinanews.com reported.
During the meeting, Liu Zhengang, director of the Office of Legislative Affairs in Beijing, said weather disasters have caused economic losses equal to 1 percent to 3 percent of GDP, noting that Beijing has a higher frequency of weather hazards, including smog, chinanews.com reported.
"The China Meteorological Administration listed smog as a meteorological disaster as early as 2007, but since it is a scientific institution rather than a legislative body, its announcement has not raised public awareness," Wang Gengchen, a research fellow with the Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told the Global Times.
"If the legal grounds can be provided to list smog as a meteorological disaster, the local government will make more efforts to fight the city's degrading air pollution. It can also raise public awareness of the danger of smog," Wang said, adding that Beijing's decision may push the whole nation to take smog more seriously.
The draft also stipulates that Beijing's air corridor system should be improved to accelerate the city's air flow, which can prevent or reduce the damage caused by meteorological disasters, including smog and high temperatures caused by the heat island effect.
In late February, the Beijing Municipal Commission of Urban Planning announced that the capital is going to build five 500-meter-wide ventilation corridors and more than 10 80-meter-wide corridors to allow breezes to cool and clean the city, The Beijing News reported.
Separately, the Beijing Municipal Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference is now conducting more in-depth research on its preliminary plans to charge congestion fees, the Legal Daily reported on Thursday.
"The collection of congestion fees [would show that] the government wants to adopt economic measures to curb air pollution. However, improper polices may tarnish the city's image," Niu Fengrui, director of the Institute for Urban and Environmental Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times.
The municipal political consultative body has also decided to issue a regulation curbing the usage of motor vehicles later this year, with a goal of keeping the number of vehicles in Beijing within 6 million by the end of 2017.
