How China Dealt With Air Pollution – Lessons for India

UPSC Syllabus Topic: GS Paper 3 -Pollution

Introduction

China moved from choking, coal-driven smog to visible gains in air quality within a decade, while India still struggles with hazardous winter air in many cities. In China, air pollution became a core development priority, backed by strict targets, heavy investment, cleaner energy, electric transport and better monitoring. India can study these choices, their limits and their relevance to its own federal structure and growth needs. How China Dealt With Air Pollution – Lessons for India.

China’s air pollution crisis

1. Rapid growth and rising pollution: After economic opening, China’s coal-based industrial growth made emissions soar. By the 2000s, thick urban haze showed the cost of power plants and heavy industry, while PM2.5 from coal, industry, vehicles and burning of crop residues became the key health threat.
2. Beijing as the symbol: Beijing’s air became a global symbol of this crisis. In 2015, its average AQI was about 144, similar to present Delhi levels. Attention during the 2008 Olympics and rising public anger turned air quality into a core political issue.

Initiatives Taken by China to Control the Air Pollution Crisis

1. Policy priority: Air pollution became a clear policy priority in China’s 11th Five-Year Plan (2006–10). It was recognised as a serious concern linked to rapid coal-based growth and urban smog, so central leaders decided that cutting key pollutants would be a core development goal, not a side issue.
2. Implementation performance: China used a top-down implementation system. The Communist Party’s organisation departments monitored how well regions met environmental goals and compared the performance of different provinces and cities.
3. Target for officials: Under the cadre evaluation system, specific targets were fixed for governors, mayors, county magistrates and other officials. Their success or failure on these air-quality and energy goals directly influenced promotions and assessments.
4. Increasing investment:

• China backed these targets with higher investment in pollution-control equipment. Industries were required to fit better filters and treatment systems, and many outdated, highly polluting plants were shut down.
• This combination of money for technology and compulsory closure of dirty capacity became a major tool to reduce emissions from coal-based power and heavy industry.

5. Adoption of electric vehicles: China also focused on the adoption of Electric Vehicles (EVs) to cut transport emissions. For example, Shenzhen fully electrified more than 16,000 buses by 2017, and other big cities expanded electric buses and cleaner public transport.
6. Shifting from coal: China has prioritized replacing coal with cleaner energy sources, such as natural gas and renewables, through policies like the “coal-to-gas” initiative.
7. Modernizing industries: Stricter emission standards have been enforced for new and existing industrial plants, including upgrading technology to remove pollutants like sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides.
8. Implementing traffic controls: Low Emission Zones (LEZs) have been introduced in cities to restrict entry for high-emission vehicles, and restrictions have been placed on the number of private vehicles through measures like license plate lotteries.
9. Large-scale afforestation: China has undertaken extensive tree-planting programs, such as the Great Green Wall, to combat pollution and improve air quality.
10. Enhanced monitoring: The country has invested in state-of-the-art air quality monitoring systems and makes hourly and daily Air Quality Index (AQI) data publicly available to inform the public about health risks.

Limitations to China Initiative

1. Top-down implementation: Strong top-down pressure leads some local officials to fake data and quietly restart factories that were officially closed.
2. Coal expansion risk: Plans to increase coal production capacity after the 2021 power shortage risk pushing PM2.5 levels and ground-level ozone back up again.
3. Weak air-quality benchmarks: China’s basic air-quality standards are set much lower than in Western countries, so even reported improvements still allow relatively dirty and unhealthy air in many big cities.

Comparing China and India: structural differences

1. Different policy approach over time: Both countries introduced environmental laws in the 1980s and air-quality programmes in the 2010s, but China’s strategy has been more steady overall.
2. Continuous plans vs emergency measures: China relies on continuous national plans, while India uses GRAP-type measures that activate after pollution breaches limits and focus on Delhi-NCR.
3. Role of political will and money: A study highlights two determinants: political will and financial resources, and clear accountability linking national standards with plant-level emission control.
4. Household pollution and biomass use: India faces household emissions from rural biomass use; LPG support helps, but clean fuel is still not affordable for many.
5. Basic services and growth: When China moved to clean up, most citizens already had reliable power; India still lacks equitable electricity access and worries that green goals may slow growth.
6. Centralised China vs federal India: China’s unitary state allows tighter top-down control, whereas India’s tiered governance has overlapping jurisdictions and weakly fixed institutional responsibility.
7. Courts and PILs as accountability tools: India’s judiciary and PILs create decentralised legal accountability, which China partly lacks.

Way Forward for India

1. Plan for long-term, nationwide action: India should move from short, seasonal responses like GRAP to steady clean-air plans covering major cities.
2. Tie targets to accountability: Like China’s cadre system, India must link air-quality goals with clear responsibility and strict plant-level monitoring.
3. Clean up power and industry: India can curb pollution by closing or upgrading dirty plants and limiting new coal power, as China did after 2013.
4. Invest in cleaner transport: Promoting public transport and large electric bus fleets, as in Shenzhen, can sharply cut city emissions.
5. Support clean fuels for households: Expanding affordable LPG and other clean options is essential to reduce biomass burning and household smoke.
6. Use science and data to guide action:

• India should expand air-quality monitoring, study which sectors (power plants, industry, vehicles, households, farms) cause how much pollution, and use this evidence to decide where to act first and how strict the rules should be.
• Clear, public data can also help check whether policies are really reducing PM2.5 and other pollutants over time.

Conclusion

China moved from severe smog to significant, though incomplete, air quality gains within a decade by combining political will, strict targets and heavy investment. India cannot copy this path in full because of its different governance structure, energy needs and social realities, but it can adapt the lessons to build its own route towards cleaner air.

Question for practice:

Examine how China’s approach to tackling air pollution can inform India’s clean-air strategy, considering both successes and limitations.

Source: Indian Express