Category: Pollution

2013 Air Quality Data

14/3/2014

Is Lanzhou finally putting its 'most polluted city' tag behind it?

New data published by Energy Desk (Greenpeace) has ranked Chinese cities according to the number of days of emergency level bad air pollution. These are days when the air quality are classed as 'very unhealthy' or 'hazardous'.

Key points are:

46 cities (out of 75) in the survey suffered more emergency level bad air days in 2013 than Lanzhou.
Lanzhou suffered just 13 days of emergency level bad air pollution in 2013.
In 2013, Lanzhou suffered fewer bad air pollution days than:

Beijing (60 days)
Xi'an (56 days)
Harbin (50 days)
Chengdu (46 days)
Shanghai (21 days)
Qingdao (20 days)
Hangzhou (19 days)

See article in The Guardian (12 March 2014).

Putting the Plan into Action: How Chinese Leaders Steer a Massive Nation

2/9/2012

Writing in Der Spiegel (German print edition, 2 July 2012), Sandra Schulz asks 'are there lessons to be taken from the Communist Party's method of governance?' The writer has been to Lanzhou to find some answers. Read article here (translated into English, published on Spiegel Online, 31 August 2012).

Updated China Air Quality Page

10/4/2011

There are some new interactive features on the Air Quality page, which lets you see the daily Air Pollution Index results of provincial cities and municipalities measured by the Ministry of Environmental Protection. Below are some screen shots:

Motion chart: major cities ranked in order of air quality, 10 April 2011

Motion chart: Lanzhou's Air Quality in 2011 (1 Jan - 10 April)

Data table, which can be filtered to highlight the information as required

Data table, filtered to show Lanzhou's results in April

LANZHOU AIR QUALITY 2010 - SUMMARY

23/1/2011

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Guidebooks to the area really do Lanzhou a disservice, and the aim of this site is to redress the balance.

There are two misconceptions about Lanzhou:

1) There's not much to see or do. Well, hopefully, this website can persuade you that a city does not need 'famous' sites to be worth exploring. See here for a few recommendations. In fact, the underrated nature of Lanzhou adds to the experience of the visit. And when people talk about wanting to get off the beaten track and see the 'real' China, Lanzhou (and the rest of Gansu) would be as good a place as any to spend some time.

2) It's the most polluted city in the world / in China (delete according to which outdated source you are reading). The Air Quality page on the site covers this in more detail (and gives sources for the charts below), but in summary: visit in the summer, and there is every chance you will enjoy clear, clean skies (as well as warm, 'dry' temperatures). In 2010, between April to September, 82% of recorded days had either 'good' or 'excellent' air quality.

Out of 359 recorded days, 63% were either 'good' or 'excellent'

Out of 177 recorded days, 40% were either 'good' or 'excellent' (first and last quarters)

Out of 182 recorded days, 82% were either 'good' or 'excellent' (second and third quarters)

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AIR QUALITY COMPARISON

14/12/2008

As ever, there are plenty of well-known cities below Lanzhou on today's air quality rankings (Dec 14), published by the Ministry of Environmental Protection.

Out of 86 locations, Lanzhou came 54th. Here is a selection of those places with worse air quality. The ranking is in brackets:

Lanzhou (54)
Xiamen (55)
Qingdao (58)
Guangzhou (60)
Tianjin (61)
Beijing (66)
Urumqi (73)
Chongqing (76)
Xi'an (79)
Harbin (81)
Chengdu (82)
Zhangjiajie (85)

That's not to say the air is pristeen here at the moment, just another reminder that Lanzhou is a pretty average city these days, when it comes to pollution. Here is a photo of Anning District, taken today from the hills:

AIR QUALITY COMPARISON

22/10/2008

The Ministry of Environmental Protection placed Lanzhou 50th out of 86 locations around China (stats for October 22). Lanzhou is on page 3, but as the results are not ranked I copied and pasted into Excel and reordered them.

The cities ranked 25-80 all got a 'good' rating. However, given that Lanzhou is often criticized for its poor air quality, I thought it would be interesting to see which places came below it. Here is a selection of the most well-known (with their ranking in brackets):

Lanzhou (50)
Changsha (54)
Chongqing (55)
Xining (60)
Hohot (61)
Chengdu (67)
Hangzhou (70)
Urumqi (74)
Xi'an (78)
Beijing (81) Light pollution
Harbin (86) Light pollution

This is what Lanzhou looks like today:

2013 Air Quality Data

Putting the Plan into Action: How Chinese Leaders Steer a Massive Nation

Updated China Air Quality Page

LANZHOU AIR QUALITY 2010 - SUMMARY

AIR QUALITY COMPARISON

AIR QUALITY COMPARISON

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