China boosts air pollution alert level

Beijing has issued the highest pollution alert for the year with smog levels on Monday rapidly crossing readings way above the hazardous mark.

Alarming levels of pollution are being recorded even as a recent government report has said that impact of climate change in China is worse than experienced globally.

Temperatures in China, for example, are rising faster than the global average, it said.

The report is expected to be tabled in Paris at UN climate change conference.

The smog situation, meanwhile, worsened across large swathes of northern China, forcing authorities in many regions to upgrade its pollution alert code from ‘yellow’ to ‘orange’, the second highest in the category before ‘red’.

“Smog will continue in most parts of north China on Tuesday and Wednesday, the National Meteorological Center (NMC) forecast. Serious pollution, along with smog, hit Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Shandong, Shanxi and Henan on Sunday and Monday,” state media said in a report.

The state-run Global Times newspaper reported that under an orange alert, apart from the suspension of production at industrial plants, construction sites are also required to halt the transportation of materials and waste, and heavy-duty trucks are banned from the roads.

Many schools in Beijing temporarily suspended outdoor activities for students; if the pollution increases Tuesday, it is likely that schools will be shut for the day.

According to pollution readings by the US embassy in Beijing, PM2.5 particles, considered extremely hazardous, exceeded the 600-mark.

Official government figures for PM2.5 stopped at the 500mark.

Meanwhile, the government report on climate change in China issued by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MST) has said that annual average temperature in China increased by the 0.9-1.5 degree centigrade since 1909, terming the increase more than the global average.