Forestry strategies against PM_2.5 pollution in Beijing

Abstract

Tree planting has been proposed by Beijing's municipal government as a measure to alleviate airborne fine particulate matter (PM) in the city as trees have large surface areas to filter pollution out of the air. To maximize this eco-efficiency, a series of active measures have been taken by the city's forestry sector. These strategies are elaborated here to provide a valuable reference for other megacities facing similar challenges.Keywords: PM 2.5 , air pollution, forestry strategies RéSuméLa plantation d'arbres a été proposée par le gouvernement municipal de Pékin en tant que mesure de réduction de la quantité de particules fines (PM) en suspension dans l'air de la ville compte tenu que les arbres offrent une importante surface foliaire pouvant filtrer cette forme de pollution de l'air. Afin de maximiser l' efficacité écologique de cette approche, une série de mesures ont été entreprises par le secteur forestier de la ville. Ces stratégies sont décrites ci-après afin de servir de références aux autres mégalopoles confrontées à de semblables défis.Mots clés : PM 2.5 , pollution de l'air, stratégies forestières 1 College of Forestry, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China 2 Beijing Forestry Carbon Administration, Beijing, China 3 The school of Nature Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China *corresponding author: e-mail liujl66@hotmail.com even approaching 1000 μg/m 3 (Sun et al. 2014). In recent years, the Government has taken a series of measures to combat this pollution. For example, 35 environmental monitoring stations have been built in Beijing and the 24 hours of data is published at http://zx.bjmemc.com.cn; industrial and energy infrastructures are being adjusted, with some heavily polluting enterprises eliminated; new vehicles are required to meet Euro V emission standards, and diesel buses are being converted to natural gas (He et al. 2001, Li and Ding 2012). These positive measures may be insufficient, however, in the face of significant economic, political and social limitations. Therefore, in addition to reducing emissions, other measures to remove airborne particles will be necessary. Reducing air pollutants by increasing urban vegetation could prove to be an effective long-term solution for the improvement of air quality (Litschke and Kuttler 2008). Effectiveness of Tree Cover in Reducing Airborne PollutionTrees may mitigate the damaging effects of airborne particles through removal and subsequent lowering of concentrations (Beckett et al. 2000, Litschke and Kuttler 2008, Prajapati 2012, Schaubroeck et al. 2014). Farmer (1993 reported that trees are biological filters for airborne particles due to their large leaf surfaces relative to ground covered. According to Cavanagh et al. (2009), trees currently remove around 300 t of air pollutants annually from Christchurch, New Zealand and around 4% of primary PM 10 (particles with a diameter smaller than 10 μm) in the West Midlands in the United Kingdom. Yang et al. (2005) Deposition is a combination of processes removing ...

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