Chinese Authorities Will No Longer Count "Blue Sky Days" In Beijing
Environment authorities in Beijing will no longer use the method of counting "blue sky days" as a gauge of air quality, which had been practiced for more than a decade.
Beijing has used a five-grade classification of air quality on the basis of pollution indices, with grade I being the best and grade V the worst. Days with grade I or II air quality are considered "blue sky days." The city launched the "Defending the Blue Sky" project in 1998, when it had only 100 days of "blue skies."
"But 'blue sky days' are only an average figure and can hardly reflect the specific situation of different areas in the city due to various factors including climate, geography and emission," said Yu Jianhua, director of the Air Quality Department under the Beijing Municipal Environment Protection Bureau, on Tuesday. "Therefore, the air quality results we released were always different from the true feelings of the general public," he said.
Yu said local environment authorities will no longer count "blue sky days" starting this year. "We will release the concentration indices of major pollutants for different areas in Beijing to measure the air quality, including particulate matter, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide," he said.
EDIT
http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2012-06/06/content_15476803.htm
= new reply since forum marked as read
no wonder china is pissed at the world(US) for reporting their pollution.
fuck them. the truth hurts.
