China: Beijing ban

The new airport and sports venues have been news for a while, but another sign of Beijing’s Olympic preparations will be visible (and possibly smellable) from Sunday. For two months, Beijing will introduce restrictions on traffic, banning odd- and even-numberplates from the city on alternate days with the aim of reducing pollution. Some 300,000 heavily-polluting trucks, too, are to be taken off the roads.

This is to make the environment more pleasant for an estimated two million Olympic visitors and to allow athletes to compete safely (International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge previously warned that some endurance events would be postponed, unless pollution levels dropped). At the moment the city is one of the 20 most polluted metropolitan areas in the world, with particulate emissions missing even the most basic targets set by the World Health Organisation.

However, along with other preparations for the Games (in the field of security, for instance) much is being sacrificed for a smooth-running competition. Taking vehicles off the capital’s roads threatens seriously to disrupt its delivery network. Other measures planned to reduce pollution, such as the closure of factories, will dent GDP (affected regions account for almost a third of China’s industrial value-added). More crucially, power stations will be shut down, taking 13 gigawatts off the grid at a time when China is already low on power. Cleaner skies over Beijing may mean darker businesses and homes further afield, at some economic and political cost.

As for Beijing drivers, talk already centres on how to dodge the ban. It could be that following a trial of the restrictions earlier in the year, those who can afford it will simply run two cars with different license plates. If so, these anti-pollution measures might end up putting more, rather than fewer, cars on the road.