China made important progress fighting against pollution in 2019. Major pollution discharges have continued to decrease, PM2.5 particles have been reduced, and ecological environment has improved as a whole.

Beijing CBD under the blue sky (Photo/People’s Daily Online)

To guarantee more blue sky days, China continued to promote clean energy heating in winter in the northern regions.

It has transformed coal power units and iron and steel enterprises into ultra-low emission sources and facilitated the treatment of volatile organic compounds in key industries.

It has strictly cracked down on illegal gas stations and oil products of inferior quality, and intensified efforts in dealing with severely polluted weather.

Meanwhile, the country has basically completed 3,626 tasks of improving the environment in 899 county-level water sources and eliminated 2,513 out of the total 2,899 putrid bodies of water in prefecture-level cities and above.

Some results have been achieved in foreign garbage reduction, with imported solid waste down by 40.4 percent year on year.

China has also allocated a special fund of 53.2 billion yuan for environmental protection and pollution regulation and imposed penalties on those in violation of the administrative laws related to environmental protection.