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Chinese police stand in line on a smoggy day in Beijing before the opening ceremony of the yearly National People’s Congress, held in the Great Hall of the People on Mar. 5, 2019. (AP/Yonhap News)

The Chinese government announced that levels of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) last year were 28% lower than five years ago. Particulate matter in China has an impact on air quality over the Korean Peninsula.

South Korea also saw fine dust levels drop by about 27% over the same period, indicating that particulate matter in both countries has fallen by around a quarter.

This information was part of a joint update on South Korea and China’s campaign to combat particulate matter. The update was published on the morning of Feb. 10 by Korea’s Ministry of Environment and China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment.

The average concentration of PM2.5 in 337 cities across China last year was 33µg/m3, meaning micrograms per cubic meter. That was down 8.3% from 2019 (36µg/m3) and 28.3% from 2015 (46µg/m3). China also reported that the air had been “good” (a PM2.5 level not exceeding 75µg/m3) on 87% of days, which was 5% higher than in 2019.

An analysis of air quality measurements in Seoul, Daejeon and Busan in 2017 found that Korea itself was responsible for just 51% of the annual particulate matter in the country, with 32% coming from China, 2% from Japan and 15% from elsewhere.

Seoul has agreed to only disclose the average rates of contribution to particulate matter in the country, so information isn’t available about how much particulate matter came from China on days when the air quality was particularly poor. But since Korea is impacted by westerly winds, lower levels of particulate matter in China can be expected to reduce levels of particulate matter in Korea as well.

Some research suggests that moisture-bearing coarse particulate matter (PM10) that blows over the Yellow Sea from China turns into fine particulate matter (PM2.5) when it comes into contact with car exhaust released in Korea.

On Feb. 10, the Chinese government said it’s working on a low-carbon, high-efficiency energy system. The plan will focus on closing small coal plants and managing unprocessed coal in the Fenwei Plain region (around Shanxi, Shaanxi and Henan) with the goal of weaning 25 million households off of unprocessed coal.

Beijing also promised to eliminate 13 million aging vehicles and vehicles that don’t meet exhaust standards and to increase the percentage of buses powered by electricity nationwide to 60%, up from 20% in 2015.

Korea reported PM2.5 levels of 19µg/m3 last year, which were even better than the government’s current goal of 20 µg/m3. That represented a 26.9% decrease from five years ago — down from 26 µg/m3 in 2015.

For the past three months since November 2020, China and Korea have been discussing ways to cooperate on reducing particulate matter in the air.

By Choi Woo-ri, staff reporter

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