Above the haze, under the dome, we breathe together and share our destiny.
Learning about pregnancy after the smog: As long as my daughter is healthy.
In January 2013, Beijing had smog for 25 days in a month.
During that month, I went on business trips to four places: Shaanxi, Henan, Jiangxi, and Zhejiang. Looking back at the sky in the video, China at that time was involved in a major smog covering 25 provinces and cities and 600 million people. But my throat had a purpose. I couldn’t sleep that night in Xi’an due to coughing. I cut a lemon and put it next to the pillow. After returning to Beijing, I found out I was pregnant.
The moment I heard her heartbeat, I felt that I had no other expectations for her - just good health. However, she was diagnosed with a benign tumor and required surgery after birth. Before I had a chance to hug her, she was taken away. I am a very lucky person. Later, I quit my job to accompany her and take care of her. As long as the family is safe and healthy together, it will be fine.
I have never been afraid of pollution before, and I never wore a mask wherever I went. Now there is a life in your arms. She breathes, eats, and drinks. You are responsible for it, so you feel scared. The haze lasted for almost two months (at the end of 2013), and it made me realize that this incident did not happen by chance, and it would not pass quickly.
This is Beijing in 2014. I can only take her out when the air is clean. But how many such days can there be? There are 175 polluted days, which means that there are 175 polluted days in a year. Half the time I had to keep her inside the house like a prisoner. The environmental protection director said to me ten years ago, "Xiaoyi is the epitome of Shanxi, and Shanxi is the epitome of China." In just ten years, I watched it become a reality.
40 consecutive days of air image records show:
Tianjin had 197 air pollution days in 2014,
Shenyang had 152 air pollution days in 2014,
Chengdu had 125 days of air pollution in 2014,
Lanzhou had 112 days of air pollution in 2014,
Shijiazhuang had 264 days of air pollution in 2014
Sometimes when I wake up in the morning, I will see my daughter standing in front of the balcony and patting the glass with her hands, telling me that she wants to go out. One day she will ask me, Mom, why did you lock me up? What is outside and will it hurt me? Everything I did during this year was to answer the questions she would ask me in the future. : What is smog? Where does it come from? What should we do?
What is smog: This is a war where the enemy cannot be seen
What is smog? I have Sometimes I turn off the lights and want to take a look. I know that PM2.5 exists among them. They are particles with an aerodynamic diameter of less than 2.5 microns, so they can refract a large amount of visible light, leaving us with a very low visibility. low world. This is a war with an invisible enemy.
A large number of samples show that there are many people who are taller than you, 20 times higher than the standard. All these carcinogens are attached to the surface of the black sampling membrane you just saw, a substance called black carbon. It is very small, only 0.2 microns, but it has a chain structure, so if it is opened, How big can two grams of black carbon be? It can be as big as an entire basketball court, so it can absorb a lot of carcinogens and heavy metals. How much black carbon is there in China? This is a calculation made by NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) in 2009. The purple and shiny place is China. (Black carbon) is floating in the sky above us like a ghost.
500,000 people die prematurely every year in China due to air pollution. In this war with mankind, our most vulnerable and vulnerable are our children and our parents. Most of these children are only more than two months old and have not been out yet, but they have already contracted pneumonia. Get nebulized treatment. In January 2013, during the heavy smog period, 27 cities in our country experienced an explosive increase in the number of emergency department visits.
Edward
Lagrence Avol (Professor of Clinical Preventive Medicine, University of Southern California School of Medicine): If they suffer some functional damage on the first day they are exposed to pollution, they will suffer some functional damage on the first day they are exposed. On the second day, their damage was not as much as on the first day, but this was not because they had "adapted", but because they had lost this part of the function and the damage had already occurred.
I live under the sky in North China. How come I haven’t noticed the existence of smog in the past ten years? I went to see Academician Tang Xiaoyan, the leader of our country’s Olympic air quality assurance team, and she gave me This curve, this is 2004.
Eleven years ago, we did not have PM2.5 detection at that time, but we did have PM10. She estimated based on that time, during the pollution period at that time, PM2.5 could reach 300 to 400. 100, which belongs to today’s severe pollution. But at that time we always thought it was fog, and we always called it fog.
It’s not that people didn’t smell the choking smell back then, but the warmth and energy brought by coal were more important at the time.
Around 1980, there were 3,700 factories in Beijing. For a large agricultural country full of development aspirations, chimneys were considered a sign of progress.
In the past 30 years, my country's lung cancer mortality rate has increased by 465%. Although smoking and aging are still the main factors in this number, the clear cancer risk of fine particulate matter has received more and more attention. In 2012, PM2.5 was included in the monitoring scope and the national "Air Pollution Prevention and Control Action Plan" was implemented. As incomes increase and information becomes transparent, people have higher and higher expectations for the environment.
I wear a mask to go shopping, I wear a mask to shop, I wear a mask to meet friends, I use tape to seal every seam of our doors and windows, and I take my children out to get vaccinated. Whenever she smiles at me, I feel scared. To be honest, I'm not afraid of death, I just don't want to live like this. So every time someone asks me, why are you doing this? I had to simply tell him that this was a personal grudge between me and Haze. I want to know where it comes from, I want to figure out what's going on.
Coal: Let China take off first, then let China "suffer"
60% of China's PM2.5 comes from burning coal and fuel oil, that is, the burning of fossil energy. How intense is this burning? We can take a look. In 2014, this value can represent the burning intensity of global fossil energy. You can see how bright China is. The place that is burning red, bright and white is our country. If you look at the graph, it's three to four times higher than in Europe, where we burn so much fossil energy. What surprised me the most was that large-scale chemical reactions can occur between coal and oil pollutants.
Deep in the abandoned mines of South Wales lies the heart of Britain's industrial age, which once powered one of the world's most powerful empires and also brought a terrible black disaster to the country. . In the 1960s, after the Great Smog Incident in London, other countries began to reduce and control their coal consumption. However, this coincided with the beginning of China's reform and opening up. This country, which had been closed and lagging behind for many years, urgently needed to It needs a huge amount of energy to take off, and its choice is coal. This is its growth curve.
So where is so much coal used in China? We can take a look at the 3.6 billion tons in 2013. Among them, 380 million tons were burned in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei, and of these 380 million tons , 300 million were burned in Hebei.
Xiong Yuehui (Director of the Science and Technology Standards Department of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and former director of the North China Inspection Center): More than 60% of steel companies do not have any approval procedures. They ignore the environmental impact assessment law and are constantly notified to stop approval. , no matter whether it is legal or illegal, the approval will be stopped. The real culprits are the gangsters. The regulatory authorities don’t want to touch this area. Is it closed? Can it be banned? How much is 10 million tons of steel? How many people are employed? With 100,000 people employed, to what extent has Hebei’s steel industry reached a point where you can’t stop it?
It took China thirty years to complete the path of industrialization that others took a hundred years to complete. Therefore, on top of our coal pollution, we have to add oil pollution. So what happened to our oil? Most of our oil is burned in our cars, and our cars have increased by nearly 100 million in ten years. Among the local pollution sources in Beijing, the largest one comes from motor vehicles.
The environmental protection department is not the only embarrassment, the smell of money is in the air
Does more cars cause pollution? The explanation given to me by the Beijing Municipal Transportation Commission is this: More than 90% of people in Tokyo of people are taking rail transit, and less than 6% of them are driving. How many are there in Beijing? 34% of people in Beijing drive. During the daily peak period in Beijing, what is the PM2.5 emissions per hour within the Sixth Ring Road? - 1 ton. How many Beijingers drive within 5 kilometers? Nearly half.
In Beijing, there is a pollution peak in the early morning of every day, and it occurs constantly every day. It is always about twice as high as the organic carbon emissions in the afternoon of that day. What on earth is this? I also wanted to know the answer, so we went to Yanqing.
(Randomly check a car)
Driver: This is from before the National First.
Chai Jing: That means there are no emission facilities.
Driver: No, there are basically no emission control measures.
Police: Green label.
Driver: National Three.
Chai Jing: Where did it come from? Hebei Provincial Environmental Protection Department.
Driver: When I bought it, he said it was from National Level 3, but we didn’t understand. Is that right? I just bought a car.
Li Kunsheng (Director of the Motor Vehicle Emissions Management Division of the Environmental Protection Bureau in Beijing): Large-scale fraud, or to put it more seriously, comprehensive fraud, this is a secret in the industry, 90% of the basic configurations are not there . If 30,000 cars enter the city, that is equivalent to millions of cars running at night.
When there are no emission facilities, what will be the result of its emissions? The emission of particulate matter from this car alone is five hundred times that of a National IV vehicle. Its nitrogen oxide emissions account for 70% of all motor vehicles, and its disposable particulate matter emissions account for 99%. What’s even more frightening is that the particulate matter emitted from the exhaust of diesel vehicles is far more toxic than normal.
If you want to hold people accountable, you should first ask the person in charge of the counterfeit car company, right?
If this kind of comprehensive and widespread fraud has been going on for more than ten years and the regulatory authorities know about it, why not How about dealing with them? Don’t we have laws? Products like yours can be recalled. But how many times has this law been applied to this type of vehicle from 2004 to now? Not once.
Ding Yan (Director of the Vehicle Pollution Research Division of the Ministry of Environmental Protection): Of course we have asked why you write it like this in your air law, why don’t you write it directly to us. People have said that it is because when this article was drafted, many departments opposed it and could not regulate environmental protection. But in the end, this law couldn't be passed. If it couldn't be passed, it ended up being written in a vague way, asking those with the power to enforce the law to do it.
Ding Yan: But in fact, I still have no control over it. The certificates are all genuine, and the models are also genuine. The environmental protection department has also issued the green label, which is also National IV. No department went to see what the car was, only that the car belonged to Guoyi.
It is not only the environmental protection department that is embarrassed, but also the car companies. The boss of the counterfeiter later told me that if the Ministry of Environmental Protection can enforce the law and catch those counterfeit vehicles, I guarantee that the second God produces it. When I was in Yanqing, I randomly checked this diesel vehicle. The diesel fuel was added in Beijing. It is already very good and the highest level in the country. However, after its diesel was tested, it was 20 times higher than that of the European Union, Japan, and the United States. Five times.
Oil companies around the world will try their best to safeguard their own industry interests. This is the nature of a company and it is understandable. We would like to know who is formulating this standard in other countries. This is the conclusion we have investigated so far - Australia: Ministry of Environmental Protection; South Korea: Ministry of Environment; Japan: Ministry of Environment of Japan; Mexico: Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources and Ministry of Energy ; Canada: Ministry of the Environment; European Standards Committee. In Australia, South Korea, Japan, Mexico, and Canada, the Ministry of Environment basically leads the standards. Even when a European standards committee like the European Union sets standards, it will have the voice of industry associations, but there has never been a situation where the petrochemical industry takes the lead in setting standards.
Then why in my country, the national vehicle fuel quality standards are dominated by the petrochemical industry? A country’s choice has its historical reasons. In the 1960s, my country was in an extreme shortage of oil. Buses on Chang'an Street needed to carry a gas bag on their heads. It was far from the time to consider fuel environmental protection indicators, and the environmental protection department had not yet been established. Therefore, the standards were formulated at that time. The Petrochemical Science Research Institute under the Ministry of Petroleum is responsible.
In China, in addition to our low oil standards, we also have another problem that I had not thought of before I set out. That is, half of our oil is completely out of control. Among the top ten in the world Ports, there are now seven in China. The pollution caused by ocean-going freighters is so great that at a distance of 400 meters from the coastline, the pollution it emits is equivalent to half a million large trucks. So in Shenzhen, 60% of the sulfur dioxide comes from ships.
Maybe you don’t live by a port, a river, or an airport, but you must have encountered these cars. These are engineering construction vehicles. When I saw them in Hebei once, I thought there was a fire in front of them. When I walked around to the front, I saw that they were emitting black smoke. We worked with the Ministry of Environmental Protection, and the people from the Environmental Protection Department said, "Well, let's go check it out and see." They bought a diesel jug ready-made, and then went to the nearest private gas station. I was the last one to get off, and when I got off, I found that his ID had been taken away by the boss.
Boss: Atmospheric Prevention and Control Law?
Chai Jing: "The environmental protection department has this obligation and power."
Boss: You have an obligation, you have an obligation, but you don’t have the right.
After the boss said this, each of us was silent, and then we all dispersed carrying the diesel pot. He said it too harshly. From coal to oil, one by one, the consumption of coal and oil is so large. Our quality is relatively low, we lack cleanliness, and we lack control when discharging. I have always wanted to know why. , until this boss, I think this sentence inexplicably reveals the essence of something.
A ton of steel, if all its environmental protection costs are saved and not installed, can save 100 yuan, a ton of coal can save 156 yuan, and a car can save 100 yuan. If we do not install environmental protection facilities, we can save about 20,000 yuan. If we upgrade the oil products one less time, we can save 50 billion yuan. Ten years ago, I asked what the air smelled like and I didn't get an answer. Now I know, the smell of money is in the air.
Learn from experience and create the future: How do the United Kingdom and the United States control air pollution?
Cities have given us personal freedom and also given this country thirty years of prosperity, and there is still more to come. There will be 300-400 million people entering the city. This is inevitable and inevitable. They will bring incredible civilization and wealth to this country, but if the model of using investment to promote industry and promote urban development does not change, what will be the result? This means that before we use up all the resources, we will use Light all ambient capacities.
I was worried before. Beijing is still expanding and its number of cars is still increasing. Can its pollution be reduced? But this is Los Angeles, a place very similar to Beijing.
It is also surrounded by mountains on three sides, and the air diffusion conditions are very poor, so it has experienced large-scale photochemical pollution smog events. But since 1970, the number of vehicles in Los Angeles has continued to increase. It has increased by so much, three times, but what about their emissions? It has dropped by 75%. How did they do it? I went to Los Angeles to observe there.
Los Angeles’ urban planning that spreads the pie is considered a typical failure. Its bus system is far from being effectively established, resulting in the unconstrained development of vehicles.
There are more than 1,700 people and more than 13 million cars. Almost everyone has one. In California, 850 million were formed in one day. All the fuel combined is enough to make 1,600 trips to the moon and back.
According to estimates from the California Department of Air Resources, 71% of the carcinogens in the air in Southern California are produced by diesel vehicles, so all diesel vehicles are required to install DPF, a particulate filter equivalent to Wearing a mask in your car can filter out 99% of particulate matter.
In order to control pollution, California has to establish the strictest motor vehicle standards for new cars. The environmental protection department has the power to spot-check any new cars, and can directly spot-check cars in use with less than 120,000 miles from users. Once they are found If a manufacturer violates the regulations, he or she will be fined US$25,000 for each day starting from the day it leaves the factory. The environmental protection department has the power to require car companies to recall all problematic vehicles.
China is a country where coal consumption accounts for 70%. How can we reduce coal in our country’s energy structure? Many people have told me that London has to wait. It took forty or fifty years to cure the pollution, and we still have to wait that long. But is that really the case? Look here, in the first ten years they started to control pollution, they reduced the pollution by 80%. This is a huge improvement. Let's take a look at what London did. of.
When the Great Smog occurred in London, nearly 90% of the British energy structure was coal. In 1953, the average concentration of particulate matter exceeded the EU standard ten times. They were under pressure to control pollution. , larger than our country currently has, the British passed the Clean Air Act in 1956.
JohnMurlis (former environmental inspector in London, UK): Every coal mine has coal washing facilities on the ground. Before selling to users, the coal must be washed first. Burning coal in an open fireplace is Illegal, this is the fireplace. Any facilities that emit soot (in smoke-free areas) are strictly prohibited. Pollution inspectors can inspect shops to see if illegal fuel is being sold.
The government will pay for 70% of the cost of home fireplace modifications, but the penalties are equally strict. Violators can be fined one hundred pounds or even jailed.
In the two decades since the smog incident, oil has replaced more than 20% of coal, and natural gas has replaced more than 30% of coal. Coal has played an important role in the entire country’s energy structure. Ninety percent dropped to 30 percent, while the share of heavy industry in GDP also fell by ten percent. Many coal mines and coal-burning factories closed, and another London landmark disappeared. There used to be millions of people employed here, how do you (miners) make money and live now?
Ed Davey (British Minister of Energy and Climate Change): More than a hundred years ago, we had millions of miners in the UK , there are only tens of thousands left now, but our employment numbers are at an all-time high. When one industry is being eliminated, another industry will rise.
Only by opening up the market can we have a cleaner sky
From 1960 to 1970, the first ten years of the UK’s pollution control period, the economy did not regress, but GDP doubled. In the next ten years, Britain entered the oil and gas era, and their economic aggregate quadrupled. The UK achieved blue skies and white clouds only when it replaced coal with cleaner energy, oil and natural gas, especially natural gas. At that time, per capita GDP was the same as that of China. The most important thing for the government was not to subsidize backward, polluting, and loss-making industries that were about to be eliminated by the times. You had to give emerging industries a chance to compete fairly. They will surprise you. London’s experience tells us that China must move from the coal era to the oil and gas era before we can get cleaner skies.
What is our natural gas proven rate? Twenty-two percent. So what is our oil discovery rate? Thirty-eight percent, and the annual production only accounts for 1/9 of the proven amount. Are there a lot of resources, we know where they are, but we have not exploited them? The United States, the world's largest natural gas producer, has 6,300 natural gas and oil companies. How many do we have? Three, of which 100% Seventy of them are concentrated in the hands of one company, PetroChina. There are 160 natural gas pipeline companies in the United States. How many do we have (main pipelines)? Three, of which 70% are concentrated in the hands of one, PetroChina.
Edward
Davey (British Minister of Energy and Climate Change): I believe that only by opening up the market can we share wisdom, seek innovation, and get the best things in the world.
Returning to the blue map requires our participation
This is the first time I have come into contact with China’s energy issues.
The corruption map of the past two years shows that it is an area with high incidence of corruption. Liu Tienan, the former director of the Energy Bureau, said during the trial that if we want to curb the high incidence of corruption, we must return the power that should belong to the market to the market. . In June 2014, China's energy national security strategy made it clear that energy is a commodity, and we must build an effective market structure and market system, and change the government's way of supervising energy. But before waiting for a country to establish and improve a huge system, what can we do?
No matter how powerful the government is in the world, there is no way to control pollution independently. It relies on everyone , ordinary people like you and me. Our choice, our will. Only information disclosure is the basis for all public participation. You can take a guess, how many Chinese public welfare organizations were qualified as judicial litigation subjects before this year? None. This is because our "Civil Procedure Law" at that time stipulated that only relevant organizations can file lawsuits. As for who is No one knows about this organization. But starting from January 1, the new Environmental Protection Law has stipulated that as long as you have been engaged in environmental public welfare activities for more than five years and have no illegal records, you can be qualified as a subject of litigation. There are now more than 700 environmental protection organizations.
We can remember these numbers, 12369. If you don't type it, it will always be just a number. When the haze comes, I don’t know where I will be tomorrow or where I will be in the future.
aware can self-test without drawing blood. I wish you a healthy day, cat!
But the moment the restaurant owner installed the oil fume (recycling device), I suddenly felt as if I had my feet firmly on the ground. It’s hard to explain this feeling clearly. You clearly know that its effect on improving air pollution is very minimal. But just because a person knows that the little things he does can make things better, he can feel at ease in his heart.
So looking back, the war between humans and pollution is how history is created. Thousands of ordinary people will one day say no, I am not satisfied. I don't want to wait, and I won't abdicate anymore. I want to stand up and do something. What I want to do is right now, right now, right here, right here.
Thousands of children are being gestated and being born. These rivers, the sky, and the earth should belong to them. We have no right to only consume without knowing. We have the responsibility to prove to them that a country illuminated by energy A bright world can be clean and beautiful at the same time. When the smog is severe, there is at least one thing we can do, which is to protect yourself and your loved ones.