Is there a quick fix for the polluting emissions from the tens of thousands of factories in the Pearl River Delta that are contributing to the heavy, grey-yellow smog that too often blankets the whole region? Yes, there is. One source of emissions - the one that is hardest to deal with - is the factories that have to run private generators for electricity because they cannot get enough power from the grid. This is the case for most of the factories in the region; to avoid frequent 'brownouts', they buy their own generators to provide alternative power.
Factories are notified in advance of when they will not receive power from the grid, so they know when they will need to turn on their generators. There is an overall power supply shortage in the region. This can only be fixed when the supply structure of power generation and distribution is greatly expanded.
These private generators can be very large, and can cost millions of dollars. To work properly, they need to be regularly maintained and serviced.
Factory managers also have to source fuel for the generators. Research by Civic Exchange and the University of Science and Technology in 2006 found that the quality of that fuel varies greatly. In some cases, the diesel fuel purchased was of a very low quality and burning it resulted in a much higher level of pollution than if the fuel had been relatively clean. There were also cases where the fuel bought was contaminated with other types of fuel, and even water. It seems that people who sell fuel for generators often mix fuels, to lower costs.
Some factory managers complained that, by using low-quality fuel, they had to spend more time and money maintaining the generating equipment, which was not designed to run on such contaminated, low-grade fuel.
Thus, the use of poor-quality fuel is far from a good solution. Yet, managers have no other choice, since they need to provide supplementary power for their factories.
It is not easy to estimate the total air-pollution impact from all these factories in the Delta, but no one denies that it is large. The quick fix is, of course, to supply only cleaner fuel to run the tens of thousands of chugging generators. A cleaner fuel going in means less-polluting emissions coming out. This is not a long-term substitute for expanding and upgrading Guangdong's power supply structure, but there is a reason to consider the quick fix in the coming two years.