PM2.5 targets alone won't solve China's smog problem
Air pollution is a top – if not the top – priority for the Chinese leadership in the upcoming 13th Five-Year Plan. With 2013 designated the “year China’s air pollution went mainstream”, China still has substantial work left to do to meet its air targets. The Ministry of Environmental Protection’s 2013 State of the Environment Report has revealed just how challenging this is: while 86.5% of surveyed cities met national standards for sulphur dioxide ambient levels, only 39.2% did so for nitrogen dioxide, and a mere 4.1% of cities met new standards for PM2.5 released in 2012…
