Chinese cities ordered to axe new projects after failing to hit winter pollution targets
Northern city mayors summoned to Beijing for dressing down after they miss benchmark for cutting the most harmful rates of pollution
China has ordered three northern cities to stop approving new projects that would increase pollution after they failed to meet air quality targets this past winter.
The mayors of Handan in Hebei province and Jincheng and Yangquan in Shanxi province were given the orders after being summoned to the Ministry of Ecology and Environment in Beijing on Thursday.
The meeting came after the cities failed to meet targets to cut levels of hazardous, breathable particles known as PM2.5 between October 2017 and March this year.
“We will continue to fight against air pollution in the name of dignity and as our mission,” Handan’s mayor, Wang Litong, said at the meeting.
China launched a campaign last October to reduce average concentrations of PM2.5 by between 10-25 per cent in 28 northern cities in an effort hit 2013-2017 air quality targets.
Although Handan was ordered to reduce traffic, cut industrial output and curb coal use in a bid to cut PM2.5 by 20 per cent over the period, it only achieved an average reduction of 15.7 per cent.