Beijing Pollution Down 27 Percent Compared to Last Year, Greenpeace Says

In what we can only really consider to be good news, Beijing's PM2.5 pollution levels saw a 27 percent decrease from January to March when compared to the same quarter in 2015, Greenpeace East Asia reported, with an average PM2.5 level of 67.7 during the first quarter.

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Greenpeace's Chinese city rankings also demonstrate that government action has had a huge impact on our fair city, which didn't appear in the list of the top 20 polluted cities in the country, and placed 11th in the list of China's most polluted provinces (technically Beijing is a municipality). The western part of the country isn't faring so well, with the top five cities with highest levels of pollution published located in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region.

The following data is pulled from their report, which can be viewed in full here.

Ranking by city (average 2016 First Quarter PM2.5 average concentration (ug/m3))
1. Kashgar, Xinjiang (276.1) 
2. Wujiaqu, Xinjiang (170.4) 
3. Urumqi, Xinjiang (160.3) 
4. Hetian, Xinjiang (146.9) 
5. Kizilsu Prefecture, Xinjiang (135.4)
6. Xinxiang, Henan (125.7) 
7. Zaozhuang, Shandong (119.1)
8. Shihezi, Xinjiang (117.1) 
9. Zhoukou, Henan (114.4) 
10. Heze, Shandong (113.7)

Ranking by province (average 2016 First Quarter PM2.5 average concentration (ug/m3))
1. Xinjiang (102.4)
2. Henan (101.8)
3. Hubei (80.3)
4. Shandong (77.6)
5. Hebei (75.7)
6. Shaanxi (74.5)
7. Anhui (72.7)
8. Jiangsu (71.8)
9. Tianjin (70.6)
10. Shandong (68.0)
11. Beijing (67.7)

More than 85.6 percent of Chinese cities ranked in this report failed to meet China's national air quality standard of 35ug/m3. None of the cities ranked met the WHO standard of 10ug/m3, and Beijing is also still far from that. That, however, doesn't mean that we can't enjoy beautiful blue sky days, which we can now officially say are becoming increasingly frequent.

Click here to see our full air pollution coverage.

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Photos: huffingtonpost.com