The newly formed ‘Yarlung Zangbo-Brahmaputra River Basin Network’ seeks to strengthen transboundary cooperation to overcome significant challenges in the region and achieve sustainable development in the region.
This year’s Beijing International Forum for Metropolitan Clean Air and Climate Actions took place in the same district where I lived some months in 2019, when I worked on air quality management in collaboration with the Beijing Academy of Science and Technology to set-up a modelling platform based on the French model CHIMERE. With characteristic energy, the district, and city, has been transformed in the five years since I left—with the revival of cycling, an abundance of green spaces, progress on solar, and perhaps the most dramatic improvement of all in the quality of the air that the city’s 22 million people breathe.
China has over the course of the last decade completely reversed its air quality, going from laggard on air quality to leader in carbon emission intensity, particulate matter (PM), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) emission reductions, with Beijing’s PM2.5 concentrations dropping from 90 µg/m3 in 2013 to around 32 µg/m3 in 2023.
What many admire most, of course, is that China proved that it is possible to ‘decouple’ air pollutant emissions and GDP growth.
Invited by Clean Air Asia, I could travel to the city this month to attend the 2024 Beijing International Forum for Metropolitan Clean Air and Climate Actions hosted by the Beijing Municipal Ecology and Environment Bureau (BEE) and supported by the BRI International Green Development Coalition (BRIGC), Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI), C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group (C40) and organized by Beijing Municipal Research Institute of Eco-Environmental Protection, Beijing Municipal Ecological and Environmental Monitoring Center, and Beijing Climate Change Management Center. This forum took place on the margins of the annual China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS).
Zhao Yingmin, Vice Minister, Ministry of Ecology and Environment of China (MEE), who often represents China at United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of Parties, and Tan Xuxiang, Vice Mayor, the People’s Government of Beijing Municipality opened the event: underscoring the progress China, and in particular Beijing, has made in addressing air quality, and the co-benefits of such action for climate outcomes. The impact of air pollution on ecosystems, green areas and glaciers were cited as important challenges.
As well as pointing out the impact of the stringent air pollution policies China has introduced since 2012, they pointed out that unilateral action alone could not solve the challenge of air pollution, given its global and transboundary nature.
Gino Van Begin, Secretary General of ICLEI spotlighted the central role of cities in reducing emissions, with a particular focus on Nature-based Solutions; Zou Ji, CEO & President of Energy Foundation China, spoke on the environmental meaning of high-quality development, underscoring the importance of China’s target of PM2.5 concentrations of 30 µg/m3 by 2030.
Julia Lipton, Director of Climate Action Planning and Innovation, C40 Cities, the leading global network for city mayors confronting the climate crisis, highlighted good practice: including Barcelona’s tourist tax to finance heat pumps and solar panels, and Boston’s efforts to discourage fossil fuel use in new buildings.
Sydney Vergis, Deputy Executive Officer, California Air Resources Board (CARB) presented on California’s work and ambition in the deployment of electric vehicles (especially trucks); and Jung Yoo-Jin, Climate & Environment Headquarters, Seoul, Republic of Korea, set out control measures adopted in Seoul to tackle volatile organic compounds, primarily released from gasoline and solvents, including paintings, favored in high temperatures.
Glynda Bathan-Baterina, Deputy Executive Director of Clean Air in Asia (CAA) emphasized the importance of regional cooperation in achieving Clean Air in Asia and the huge opportunity to learn from China’s leadership on air pollution.
Liu Baoxian, Deputy Director General of Beijing Municipal Ecology and Environment Bureau (BEE) unveiled updated statistics on pollution and carbon in the city: with Beijing recording 271 days of good air quality, 95 days more than 10 years ago.
In Beijing, since 2013, carbon emission intensity has been reduced by more than 50%, PM emissions by 64%, SO2 emissions by 89 %, NO2 emissions by 54%. These reductions translated in improved wellbeing of publics, and recognition by the international community. Keeping these mitigation efforts could lead in 2035 to concentrations below 25 µg/m3.
Matthew Katz, Senior Program Officer, ICLEI USA presented a dashboard to monitor GHG emissions based on AI (Artificial Intelligence) techniques and other functionalities (ClimateView Plateform 2.0).
Science and data to guide and assess mitigation action remains key to maintaining emission reductions. In Beijing, data is drawn from online reporting from industries, monitoring of flying dust from construction, and volatile organic compounds, with machine learning deployed to manage data and identify sources and ultimately to treat any violations of environmental laws.
China’s air quality forecasting can be delivered by models like the EarthLab system, which couples atmospheric, ocean and ecosystem models, Pr. Wang Zifa, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences told delegates. The tool uses a French application, MUNICH, to simulate air quality up to the street level.
Despite the huge progress made in reducing PM2.5 concentrations since their maximum in 2013, challenges remain, reductions of PM2.5 concentrations now starting to stall. Ozone concentrations remain an issue and have even increased since 2015. However, there are huge lessons South Asia, and the world can learn from China’s approaches, with a huge amount to be done to increase interregional collaboration and national action to ensure we genuinely secure clean air for everyone. The good news is how open Chinese local and central government seem to sharing what has worked.