Rhian Wilkinson's Official Website

RHIAN'S SOCCER JOURNALS:

BEIJING'S OLYMPIC QUEST: TO TURN THEIR SMOGGY SKY BLUE

10th December 2007

With information from a New York Times article by Jim Yardley

The National Women's squad has already been to China twice in the last nine months, once on tour, and then again for the FIFA World Cup. On 11th January 2008, they are scheduled to visit China again for a Four Nations Tournament.

Most of the Canadian team has become very aware of the problems they may encounter with China's pollution, but there are many new players in this trip. The last time, for the FIFA World Cup, several on the squad had trouble adapting to the climate and pollution.

In April, 2008, if the team qualifies in Mexico for the Beijing Olympics then they will visit China again. This means that they will have played in these conditions on four separate occasions. There is little evidence that one can become acclimatized to the pollution. Rhian says that from her experience, the effects of the pollution kick in fully on day three or four. Before that players notice the smog and the poor air quality, but it takes a few days for the “knot” to develop at the back of the throat. Then, she reports that after three or four days you start getting a dry cough, something you seem to develop to try to dislodge the “knot from developing.” Later, players “start to feel the strain which the lungs are under while running. All of a sudden, everything gets harder. A run that you can easily do back home, suddenly becomes a real effort. It’s a very odd sensation.”

In April 2007, as part of their preparation for games in China at the FIFA Women's World Cup, the National Women’s Team underwent respiration breath tests. The team’s medical staff made sure that everyone on the squad was tested for any kind of respiration problem before departure, so that the necessary steps could be taken to minimize any risks. Team physiologist Greg Anderson also traveled to China with the team in order to see how they performed in the less than ideal conditions of Chinese smog. Rhian explains, "basically, the test involves blowing into a tube, which is attached to a machine and a computer that measures lung capacity.”

Canadian soccer players may well worry, as The New York Timesreported in December 2007 that every day, monitoring stations across Beijing are measuring air pollution to determine if the skies above China's national capital can officially be designated blue. "This is not an act of whimsy: with Beijing preparing to play host to the 2008 Olympic Games, the official Blue Sky ratings are the city’s own measuring stick for how well it is cleaning up its polluted air."

Thursday 27th December 2007 did not bring good news . "The gray, acrid skies rated an eye-reddening 421 on a scale of 500, with 500 being the worst. Friday rated 500. Both days far exceeded pollution levels deemed safe by the World Health Organization. In Beijing, officials warned residents to stay indoors until Saturday, but residents here are accustomed to breathing foul air. One man flew a kite in Tiananmen Square."

“We’re definitely hoping for the best,” said Jon Kolb, a member of the Canadian Olympic Committee, “but preparing for the worst.” As the New York Times says, "For the world’s Olympians, Beijing’s air is a performance issue. The concern is that respiratory problems could impede athletic performance and prevent records from being broken. However, for the city’s estimated 12 million residents, pollution is an inescapable health and quality-of-life issue ."

Beijing has long ranked as one of the world’s most polluted cities. To win the Games, Beijing promised a “Green Olympics” and undertook environmental initiatives now considered models for the rest of the country. However, "Beijing is like an athlete trying to get into shape by walking on a treadmill, yet eating double cheeseburgers at the same time. Polluting factories have been moved or closed. But auto emissions are rising as the city adds up to 1,200 new cars and trucks every day. Dirty, coal-burning furnaces have been replaced, lowering the city’s sulfur dioxide emissions. But, fine-particle pollution has been exacerbated by a staggering citywide construction binge that shows no signs of letting up."

"The ruling Communist Party envisions the Games as a public relations showcase and is leaving no detail untended. Scientists are cross-breeding chrysanthemums to ensure that flowers bloom in August. Now Beijing is also going to try to manipulate air quality. For months, scientists have treated the city like a laboratory, testing wind patterns and atmospheric structure, while pinpointing local and regional pollution sources. Olympics contingency plans have been approved for Beijing and surrounding provinces. Details are not public, but officials have discussed shutting down factories and restricting traffic during the Games."

“We are determined to ensure that the air conditions meet the necessary standards in August 2008,” Liu Qi, president of the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games, told the International Olympic Committee’s executive board this month.

Beijing residents overwhelmingly support the Games and take for granted that officials will do what is necessary to ensure clean air. Last August, the city removed a million cars from roads during a four-day test intended to gauge pollution and traffic. But people also know that any emergency measures have a limited shelf life.

“Beijing officials say the Olympics will have a lasting and positive environmental legacy on the city. International Olympic Committee officials acknowledge that air quality remains a problem, but they say the air would be far worse without improvements made for the Games. “The general trend is improvement,” said Simon Balderstone, an environmental adviser for the I.O.C..

However, the New York Times reports that there is also "an explosion of car ownership that has led to gridlocked traffic and a halo of auto fumes." The Canadian players were often caught in traffic on the way to matches or practices, even with police outriders. "Beijing now has more than three million vehicles and is adding more than 400,000 new cars and trucks each year. Rhian says that she will ”never forget her first day in Beijing. There were so many cars and trucks coming from every direction, that she had to have her head on a swivel at all times when crossing the street. Cars come from every direction and with very little direction to the chaos. There were fewer cars going along the sidewalks in Beijing, but there were plenty in smaller cities.” The city’s reliance on cars and trucks leaves its air with few reprieves.

Beijing’s problems are compounded because its public transportation system has been neglected for years. Now, the city is expanding subway lines and finishing a rail line from the airport to downtown, but car ownership is expected to keep rising. Rhian remembers being astounded that “when taking the underground train system I found myself in the most spacious place I found in the whole of China. No one seems to use it. The subway cars have people in them but the very fact that there are empty seats in a country as populated as China says much about their use of public transport.”

Mr. Kolb, the Canadian Olympic official, spent much of August in Beijing trying to answer the question hanging over the city as the Games approach: Has air quality actually improved? An environmental physiologist, Mr Kolb visited several stadia to measure pollution with a small monitoring device. On Aug. 5, his measurement of fine particles pollution, or PM 10, reached 200, roughly four times above the level deemed safe by the World Health Organization. “We’re worried,” Mr. Kolb said. Of Beijing air pollution, he added: “There’s no doubt about it. It’s off the charts.”

Average daily levels of PM 10 exceed national and W.H.O. standards. Earlier this year, a report by the United Nations Environment Program concluded that “air pollution is still the single largest environmental and public health issue affecting the city.” “Particularly worrying are the levels of small particulate matter (PM 10) in the atmosphere, which is severely deleterious to public health,” the report stated.

The New York Times reports that "Mr. Kolb said some Olympic athletes were worried about ozone, which can inflame the respiratory tract and make it more difficult to breathe. But Beijing’s monitoring system does not measure ozone, nor does it measure the finer particulates known as PM 2.5. Xu Jianping, 55, a business consultant, does not need to be told that Beijing is overrun with cars and construction. He is an avid in-line skater who enjoyed skating to work until pollution left him spitting out black phlegm. He went online and ordered a gas mask. But I don’t want to wear it,” said Mr. Xu, fearing his mask would be misinterpreted as a protest against the Olympics. “It would hurt China’s image.”

Qualifying for Beijing in Mexico in April may be the first of Canada's National Women's team's problems, before a return to the dangerous smog of China.