It’s time to impose laws to help clear the air
SCMP
Let’s be clear: Hong Kong has the ways and means to keep air clean and safe, or at least cleaner or safer than it is now. The Environmental Protection Department has a multi-billion-dollar budget and more than 1,600 staff to help achieve this objective. Yet 44 days a year, the levels of pollution along streets in Central are dangerous to health. How can this be?
For too long, the issue of air pollution has revolved around blame, not solutions. For years the government passed off haze and smog as mostly being beyond its control, pointing to factories and power plants in Guangdong province. The same reason and the weather have been put down to high readings at roadside monitoring stations. But such explanations are at odds with those given by environmentalists and independent scientists, who say the source is more often than not local.
Just look at the numbers. While readings from EPD monitors at rooftop stations show a significant improvement in air quality, there has been a marked degradation beside roads in Central, Mong Kok and Causeway Bay. Analysis of data by this newspaper found that in Central last year, readings were above the “very high” 100 mark on 44 days, five days more than in 2008 and 31 more than in 2005. In Mong Kok, there was only one such day five years ago, but 37 last year. The figure for Causeway Bay was 25, up five-fold on the number for 2005…
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