Heavy smog casts pall over Beijing as it bids for Olympics

Air pollution hit hazardous levels in Beijing yesterday, presenting a new challenge to leaders who have tried to curb smog via higher taxes and casting a pall over the city’s bid for the 2022 Olympic Games.
The concentration of PM2.5, the particulates that pose the greatest risk to human health, was 444 micrograms per cubic meter as of 5 p.m. at Tiananmen Square, according to the Beijing Municipal Environmental Monitoring Center. A U.S. Embassy monitor put PM2.5 levels above 450, about 20 times higher than World Health Organization-recommended levels.
Beijing has promised to curb air pollution as part of its bid for the 2022 Winter Olympics, with plans for lasting changes to go along with the sort of short-term control efforts it imposed when it hosted the 2008 summer games. The government raised the fuel consumption tax three times in the past two months.
Last year, the capital reported 93 days when the air quality index dropped below 50, up from 71 days in 2013, according to the city. Yesterday’s pollution has become the norm for January, after concentrations of PM2.5 hit similar levels in 2014 and surged to a record level of 993 in 2013, an incident that came to be known as “airpocalypse.” Bloomberg