Apr142017

Colleges, hospitals to be moved to Xiongan New Area

East Asia
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CHINA-HEBEI-XIONGAN NEW AREA (CN)

Aerial photo of Xiongan New Area [Photo/Xinhua]

Some hospitals and universities will relocate from downtown Beijing to suburbs and nearby Xiongan New Area in Hebei Province to relieve the city of functions nonessential to its role as China’s capital, 21st Century Business Herald reports.

Construction on some projects is likely to begin within the year, it said.

Beijing’s development and reform commission recently unveiled key construction initiatives for 2017, including nine that involve new, expanded or relocated projects for colleges and hospitals including Renmin University, Beijing Film Academy, Beijing Friendship Hospital and Peking University People’s Hospital.

Earlier reports said some of the city’s administrative agencies, companies, financial institutes, colleges and research institutes would be moved to Xiongan.

Chen Yao, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said colleges, hospitals and related operations, institutions and agencies could all shift to this area in future.

Yin Zhigang, a Beijing-based researcher, said it is necessary for Xiongan to host non-capital functions that are shifted away from Beijing. “It’s not necessary for citizens across the country to come to the capital to see a doctor anyway,” he noted.

Colleges closely related to the development of local industries will be the priority, it was added. In Yin’s opinion, those set up in Xiongan should integrate with local science and technology industries and companies, and share resources with others.

The New Area about 100 km southwest of downtown Beijing will span three counties that sit at the center of the triangle formed by Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei’s provincial capital Shijiazhuang.

Apr142017

Cleaner air

John Redwood MP
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There is a growing mood in favour of cleaner air. There is general agreement that the air in city centres like London needs urgent action to clean it up. In the centres of our Thames Valley towns there is also room for improvement. Some are already blaming the diesel car as the main cause and urging higher taxes or bans on diesel vehicles.  It is a good idea first to examine what we know about the sources and causes of pollution.

The London Assembly researched the sources of Nox in London in 2015. This showed the following sources

Bus, coach and rail public transport    18%

Goods vehicles    17%

Gas heating systems    16%

Non road mobile machinery    14%

Diesel cars    11%

Petrol cars and motorcycles  8%

Aviation    8%

Industry   7%

The TFL study in 2016 showed a similar pattern, with gas heating and industry  as the biggest source, and with  both bus and coach and goods vehicles each a bit bigger than diesel cars.

The new Euro VI standards for engines require both petrol and diesel engines to emit less than 5mg per km of particulates. They allow just 80 mg of Nox for diesels compared to 60 mg for petrol, whilst allowing petrol engines to emit more carbon monoxide than diesels (100mg versus 50mg)

In order to clean up the air, especially removing particulates, requires replacement of a lot of older technology buses, trains, cars, and  gas boilers. This will also allow the introduction of equipment which is more fuel efficient, also helping to drive down emissions and cut running costs.

Instead of working up a new series of penalties for owners of older diesel cars, government should work on a range of incentives to tackle the problem in a broad based way, removing the oldest buses, lorries, cars and boilers which would do the most to improve the position. it could also give a welcome boost to the home industries that produce these items.

We should not ignore the contribution replacing old heating boilers at home and work can have, with the added  bonus of cutting running costs. Lets have better scrappage and financing schemes, so more people can afford to make their contribution to cleaner air, and can at the same time take pride in owning better machines.