Wuxi sees better air quality

Wuxi in East China's Jiangsu province had better air quality this year, the Wuxi Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment said at a news conference on April 19.

This year, the city is targeting an average of 27 micrograms per cubic meter of PM2.5 concentration and 80.8 percent of good-air days.

As of April 15, the average PM2.5 concentration was 24.8 micrograms per cubic meter, dropping 8.9 percent from last year. The PM2.5 concentration and improvement rate placed Wuxi in first place in Jiangsu.

The ratio of days with good air was 90.5 percent, up 7.6 percent year-on-year and ranking second in the province.

At the end of last year, Wuxi released nearly 2,000 projects to treat and prevent air pollution with a focus on volatile organic chemicals, ultra-low emission transformation, and the packaging and printing and foundry industries. Currently, 1,175 of these projects have been completed.

Moving forward, the city will encourage about 3,500 enterprises from the steel structure, furniture, printing, and vehicle maintenance and repair sectors to use low VOCs as raw and auxiliary materials.

In addition, Wuxi plans to build five centers, including an activated carbon regeneration center and a solvent recovery center, to treat ozone pollution this year.