Where did the smog in Beijing come from?

Answer 1

There are a few contributing factors to Beijing's smog levels. First and foremost is electricity generation that comes from the burning of coal. Coal is burned to power and heat people's homes as well as providing energy for factories. The neighboring province of Hebei is a heavily industrialized area and accounts for more than a quarter of all of China's steel production. These factories are required to make use of pollution minimizing technologies but they are often not used in order to cut operating costs. While laws exist to minimize pollutants the rampant corruption in China makes it easy for factory owners to ignore these laws. The amount of personal vehicles in Beijing is also a contributing factor as many locally produced cars are not equipped with catalytic convertors and the gasoline produced by sinopec does not meet the international standards for cleanliness and has amounts of sulphur that would never be permitted in more developed countries. China has a tough battle ahead to find a long term solution but the first steps need to be stamping out corruption, hard enforcement of environmental laws and supplementing the use of coal with natural gas or other sources of energy. Getting as many people out of their cars and back onto their bicycles would help too and incentives should be offered to people willing to do so.