CCTV — Haze has covered about 1.4 million square kilometers of China’s total land area as of Sunday afternoon, according to the National Meteorological Center (NMC).
The center is maintaining an orange alert for haze from Sunday for north China, warning that air pollution will be the most severe from Monday evening until Wednesday.
Various cities in east and central China issued a red alert for severe air pollution on Thursday, and as their caution paid off, heavy haze arrived a bit later than previously forecast.
Local authorities of Shijiazhuang City of Hebei Province sent 17 inspection teams to check whether coal-fired boiler companies and industrial companies were illegally discharging emissions.
The city of Xinxiang in central China’s Henan Province, raised its alert from orange to red on Saturday, carried out car restrictions on roads and cut emissions for factories.
The haze in Harbin City of northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province hasn’t affected the local traffic. According to the local meteorological department, the haze will last until Tuesday and the air quality is expected to improve on Wednesday.
China has a four-tier warning system for severe weather, with red being the most serious, followed by orange, yellow and blue.