China is notorious for poor air quality. About two years ago
world newspapers wrote about political fireworks (Get it? Fireworks and China?
No? Okay, blog on that later.) set off by State Department Mission to China
into the smog filled Chinese skies. China, too, had a system to determine air
quality, but the readings differed in substances monitored, and frequency. Air
quality rumors still abound, but the political differences were worked out long
before the Maguires arrived in Shanghai.
The State AQI is located somewhere on the US Consulate compound.
This is public knowledge, but I have no idea where the monitor is and don’t
really care. On ground level, after I have stopped, dropped, and rolled, I find the air to be fresh and clean there as it
is filtered by a park-like abundance of trees, plants and flowers. Still, the
shafts of sunlight highlight millions of particles floating in air and the air I breathe tastes gritty.
The air in the outlying neighborhoods appears to be worse
than at the Consulate. This is not proven true, but completely antidotal. I don’t
electronically check the air quality every day. When I walk the children to
school in the morning we observe the buildings in the distance. How distinct
are the outlines? What color is the sky? We can usually guess within 30 PPM.
This may seem like a wide margin of error, but we are really talking about the
difference between unhealthy and unhealthy. See below.
A quick search of Google gives several websites and apps.
More often than not, the top hits are based on the US Mission to China
readings. The following sites officially explain the readings and offer
monitors.
I wrote this rather than hashing today. The air quality was over 300 in the morning. It was the third day in a row of Very Unhealthy or Hazardous readings. Not a great day to go on a run. Definitely not a great day to force the kids to run.
U.S. Consulate Shanghai Air Quality Monitor
Comprehensive description of air quality and stages. The
reading is currently 188, unhealthy.
Consular General
Shagnhai Twitter Feed
Hourly updates. The reading is currently 181.
Real-time Air Quality
Reporting System: Shanghai Environmental Monitoring Group
Consolidating Chinese and Ameircan readings, this site has the
best visual representation of air quality. Today the reading is 193 and there
is a cartoon Chinese girl crying.
Health and Safety in
Shanghai
Dedicated to educating Shanghai residents. This site is longer, but more comprehensive
and better funded than mine.
Get the app at any of
your favorite app stores.
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