The Olympic marathon course will take athletes on a tour past many of Beijing’s best-known sites. The race will start in front of the Forbidden City, the most identifiable symbol of the city’s ancient history, and will end at the National Stadium, arguably the most recognizable symbol of the modern Beijing.
But there is a risk that endurance events such as the marathon might be postponed should air pollution in the city reach dangerous levels. This would be a crushing blow after the years Beijing has spent trying to improve its air quality so as to provide a picture-perfect Olympics.
Manufacturing has been moved to neighboring provinces, and emergency measures, such as a temporary halt in construction and limits on car usage, will be in effect during the games.
But to many, these emergency measures are a sign that Beijing’s environmental policy has already failed.
“These measures are a clear indicator that efforts to provide sustainable improvements are unsuccessful and [they] will not continue after the games,” said Steven Andrews, an independent US-based environmental consultant.
Beijing’s skies may very well be clear for the Olympics, but the environmental challenges facing the city will persist long after the final tourist has returned home, as will the economic and human costs that arise from these challenges.
On the brink
Both the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) released damning reports on China’ s environment last year. The WHO estimated that the economic cost of water and air pollution stood at US$100 billion annually. The OECD said healthcare costs could account for 13% of China’s GDP by 2020, with pollution causing 600,000 premature deaths.
According to the UN Environment Program, Beijing’s levels of small particulate matter continue to exceed the WHO’s air quality guidelines, sometimes by more than 200%.
Signs in the skies
The Chinese government often points to the rising number of “blue sky days” – a metric that has become shorthand for air quality – as evidence that air pollution is easing. The Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Agency has put the number of “blue sky days” last year at 246 last year, compared to 185 in 2001.
But Andrews believes the actual number is far lower. He said that Beijing weakened the standards for “blue sky days” in 2000, and in 2006 stopped using two monitoring stations in heavily trafficked areas to calculate Beijing’s pollution levels. By his estimation – which is based on Chinese government data and reports – there were 191 “blue sky days” in 2007, even fewer than the 203 recorded by the government in 2002.
“Beijing’s air pollution levels are among the worst in the world. I believe the primary culprit is the lack of enforcement of environmental regulations and the lack of public awareness,” he said, noting that the heaviest polluters were from coal-fired plants, heavy industry and heavy trucks.
As dire as the air pollution problem appears, it may not be the greatest environmental threat facing Beijing. Following decades of ferocious industrialization, an insufficient water supply has moved front and center among the city’s woes.
“The biggest challenge [facing Beijing] is an economic challenge centered on the lack of sufficient water,” said Shen Tiyan, an associate professor at Peking University’s school of government.
A recent study by Toronto-based environmental advocacy organization Probe International says that a prolonged 25-year drought, increasing population, high levels of pollution and misguided policy decisions have led to a water crisis in the once-lush capital. It found that water resources available in Beijing municipality on a per capita basis have dropped to less than 230 cubic meters in 2008, compared to over 1,000 cubic meters in 1949.
“As such, Beijing has become one of the world’s most water-scarce megacities with per capita water use now less than one-thirtieth of the world average,” the report said.
The Olympics are taking their toll too. Some estimates put total water consumption for the games as high as 200 million cubic meters, much of which will go to water-intensive sports facilities.
Nevertheless, the government is keen to showcase water-saving technologies at Olympic venues as part of its desire to host a “green Olympics.”
General Electric provided three of these technologies. Two of them – a rainwater recycling system and a water purification system – can be found at the National Stadium, while the third – a membrane filtration system – converts wastewater that will then be used to supply Olympic Green, home to the tennis, archery and field hockey events.
Zhou Weifang, Greater China president of GE Water & Process Technologies, said that Beijing, like the rest of water-starved northern China, is a growth market for GE’s water technologies.
“The Beijing market is big because of the population growth due to economic development and the 2008 Olympic Games,” Zhou said.
Beijing’s policy makers have long been aware of a looming water crisis facing the city, according to James Nickum, a professor at Tokyo Jogakkan College and an author of several books that examine water management in China.
“[The government] isn’t sweeping the problem under the rug. Beijing does have a long-term plan for water supply, centered around the Yangtze diversion that is supposed to be up and running by 2010, if not before,” he said.
The Yangtze water diversion, also known as the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, first envisioned by Mao Zedong in 1952 but only approved by the State Council in 2001, will channel as much as 48 billion cubic meters of water from the south of China to Beijing at a cost of US$60 billion.
But Probe International likens such plans to “trying to quench thirst by drinking poison.” It warns that these diversions are costly and damaging to the environment, and even with this new water, Beijing will still rely on groundwater for three billion cubic meters of water annually.
Analysts agree that in order to properly address the water crisis, Beijing will have to enforce existing environmental laws more strictly and allow prices to directly reflect the true cost of water.
The current price of water in Beijing is RMB3.7 (US$0.54), and has been raised nine times over the past 15 years.
Nickum believes that “economics usually works with water” and instruments such as price hikes have helped drive down water consumption in the capital, though current prices have yet to reflect scarcity levels. Given these factors, he said Beijing’s water crisis may not represent the doomsday scenario that some have predicted.
“The water situation is a huge problem,” he said. “But probably solvable.”