The Shanghai Ministry of Environmental Protection has released some information our allergies had long ago alerted us to: the air quality of the city for the last half year has been absolute crap. Still, amongst the 113 cities being monitored in China, we're actually not too bad off - we're at the "second level," which means "within standards" in the three-level system. None of the cities made it to level one (the cleanest). Beijing, of course, has air so crazybad it's in level three.
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Everyone probably noticed that on November 1, 2010, the skies hazed up almost immediately. In case anybody was wondering if it was just a weather fluke, here's proof it wasn't: The day after Expo ended, the amount of particulate matter in Shanghai's air more than doubled from the day before (more than tripling the amount from October 30, even). In fact, it was the third-worst day of 2010 (there were two days in March that were even more terrible). more ›

While China's air may seem pretty terrible from satellite photos, apparently Shanghai has become a little more breathable thanks to the Expo. Says Shanghai Daily, "A total of 121 days, or 98.4 percent of the days between May and August, were marked as having excellent or good air quality." How did they manage it? By putting controls on "hay burning" - reducing the amount of land allowed to grow wheat and teaching farmers other ways to get rid of hay. Who would've thought? more ›

One stereotype that's probably true about foreigners in China is that they're very complainy. But did you know Shanghai was actually studying their complainy-ness? A Shanghai Committee has found that the thing foreigners in Shanghai love to complain about the most is air quality. Said the survey, "Foreigners said flying dirt from construction sites is an important cause tarnishing local air quality and they long for a better and clearer sky after the event opens." Air quality even beat out other nuisances, like trash, lack of bilingual service, and internet speed. So the next time you're whining about your post nasal drip, you can know: your peers are doing the same exact thing! more ›

The annual Shanghai Environmental Bulletin was released yesterday and, continuing the slew of good news we've been hearing about the air quality in the city, it found that sulfur dioxide emissions, a major air pollutant, have been cut 15% in the last year. Despite the change, acid rain still made up almost 75% of Shanghai's rain events - a whopping number that officials still somehow spun into good news. After all, it's less than the 79.2% of acid rain events in 2008 and represents the first drop after five years of increases. Yay... Is this why my umbrellas always end up corroding over here? more ›

We knew we noticed more blue skies this year. Apparently a total of 334 days (91.5%) in Shanghai registered as having excellent or good air quality - the highest percentage since records began to be taken. Yes! We already found out we were better than Beijing, but it's nice to beat our own personal record. But what about all those "foggy" days? Well, perhaps a lot of it was just water vapor... or maybe small particulate matter, since China doesn't actually measure those even though they're more harmful. Eh. more ›

CNNGo went around Shanghai's bars and clubs recently in a confusing article about air quality. Confusing namely because they said they're testing for the best and worst, but only six bars/clubs make the story and, really, the only one that got lambasted was The Shelter, which had a ppm ([thousand] parts per million of criteria pollutants) of 350. Regular air quality in Shanghai is 230 and the U.S. FDA says 150 is in the high end of the safe zone. Because we needed an air quality meter to tell us that it hurts to breathe in The Shelter. Anyway, apparently one of the best places to go for a breath of fresh air is Sin. But while your lungs will feel clean, can all the ventilation there stop your soul from feeling dirty? more ›