China Issues Orange Alert in its Seven Northeast Cities amid Increased Smog

According to the latest updates, cities in northeast China were blanketed in thick smog over the weekend and the weather bureau on Saturday has issued second-highest warning - 'Orange alert' for seven areas in the region.

On Sunday, the central meteorological administration has further warned of heavy smog in Tianjin and cities across Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Anhui, Jiangsu and Hubei provinces. While the visibility in some of the areas in Hebei, Shandong, Henan and Hubei province was less than 200 meters, in some worst affected areas, visibility was less than 50 meters.

Industrial sites including steel mills, coke plants, and aluminum smelters are ordered to curtail output by at least an average of 30% during the alerts and diesel-fuelled trucks will also be restricted from transporting commodities.

Over the past two years, China has stepped up its efforts to reduce air pollution which becomes particularly severe in winter because of coal burning. Beijing issued its first orange smog alert for the winter in November. The Chinese government has also already sent inspectors to 31 provinces in the last two years and punished 10,000 people for violating environmental protection regulations.

Although the country has dropped blanket production cuts in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei province for localized measures, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) said it would not relax environmental protection targets in 2019.

Despite its efforts to reduce smog, Henan province saw air pollution worsen in December, with PM2.5 averaging 82 micrograms per cubic meter - an increase of 12% from the year before.