China finally solves their air pollution problem.

[This picture compares downtown Beijing the day after a rainfall and a "normal" day.]
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After decades of air quality problems that have recently begun to haunt them as the Olympics are due there this summer and the IOC has warned that some events may have to be cancelled because of the poor air quality.

Chinese officials were under the gun to fix the problem and instituted a trend used in Mexico City, banning motorists from using their personal vehicles on certain days of the week. This made moderate improvements traffic but as far as air quality is concerned there was no significant change… except in the way Beijing now classifies pollution.

Beijing reported in December that they finally reached their goal of 245 “blue sky days.”

Meteorologists estimate there were actually in the range of 65 “blue sky days” the other 299 would have received air quality alerts, except the government ordered that the air be clean.
So China cleaned the air simply by labeling smog and haze as fog. Now the brown and gray haze that hangs in the air is not smoke or smog, it is simply fog.

(And if you get to the end of the attached story you’ll see they are blaming the fog as causing the air quality to deteriorate. I love delusional people, they are so funny.)

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Fog slows China’s power supply - SHANGHAI 11 January – Fog continues to hinder all traffic in the Yangtze delta. Several hundred vessels are out at sea, waiting for the fog to clear so they can enter the ports. With visibility below 100m on some stretches, the fleet of ageing barges that sail without navigational equipment is not allowed to leave port – which has led to a major problem for the city’s coal-burning power plants. To ensure supply, the Marine Safety Administration has given priority clearance to coal transport, opening special channels, whether there is fog or not. The fog has been blanketing large parts of China, both coastal and inland, with visibility sometimes below 50m for long periods. Since last week, ferries have repeatedly been ordered to shore, while most flights to and from both Shanghai’s and Nanjing’s airports have been delayed. Highways have seen a multitude of bloody pile-ups, forcing authorities to shut them to avoid further accidents. Air quality is rapidly deteriorating because of the continuing fog.