Pollution always this bad?

A

Ali71

Banned
We've only been in Hong Kong a short time and the pollution over the last few days has really freaked me out about whether we made the right decision to come. It seems so bad, much worse than I'd heard. Is it normally like this ? July and August were so clear! I've got the an air purifier and plants in the flat to help; and I feel the air conditioning also clears the air, but going outside I worry about my LO (18 months). Please tell me it's not going to be like this for another 10 months until the wind changes, otherwise I shall seriously think about going back to the UK. Someone did say it was the worst day of the year, I am hoping they were right.?
 
Hello Ali71
Usually the air quality is dreadful between October and April!
I am also very worry about my baby health.
I try to give her only organic and good quality of food to compensate.
I think also to leave HK for this reason.
 
Yes - I grew up in Hong Kong and I can really see the air quality deteriorating every year. It is really unbearable sometimes. We had our summer holiday in the mountains in Austria this year and the air and water is like from heaven compared to Hong Kong.

:Butbut

We don't plan to leave the city because Hong Kong is home for us. But we did moved to Stanley a few years ago. We like it there because it is not so crowded, not so far from the city, totally self-sufficient and the air seems a lot fresher. My baby is now 1.5 years old. We always take him for walks around Stanley, go to the beach or hike around Tai Tam Reservoir. We would avoid places like Causeway Bay or even Central sometimes. The air and also the crowd there are just dreadful. A lot of children have asthma in Hong Kong - I hope my baby will be lucky not to develop that.
 
No, this is pretty much as bad as it gets. It's not going to be this dreadful until May, although there will be other bad days. The visibility for the rest of the year is never as good as July and August but it's not usually as bad as last week.

Blee is right, air quality is better away from the downtown areas, because although the pollution is bad due to the number of factories and power stations in the nearby part of mainland China, local traffic pollution is a heavy contibutor.
 
We live Southside and the pollution has also been terrible. Sure it's not as bad as Central but it's still completely disgusting. We will definitely not be staying here. Nothing is worth breathing in this air, I don't know how people can put up with it. We had three beautiful months this summer and it's so sad to see those days go. Hong Kong is a beautiful place that will be unbearable to live in in a few years time. For anyone who has come from a place with good air i think it is already too bad to put up with :(

Such a shame, it has so many other things going for it.
 
We moved to Southern California about 10 months ago, partly due to the deteriorating air conditions in HK. We lived there for almost 11 years but with the birth of our daughter last year, it was really time to go. Although we loved taking walks and getting out of the flat, I always wondered whether I was doing my baby more harm than good! People always complain about the smog in L.A. but I tell them, it's nothing compared to HK - I find the air so refreshing clear here!
 
Ali71 said:
Is it normally like this ? July and August were so clear! Please tell me it's not going to be like this for another 10 months until the wind changes, otherwise I shall seriously think about going back to the UK.
Click to expand...

The air will remain this way until the outdoor temps heat up.
In a nutshell, when Tibet heats up it sucks air off the ocean and HK air is clean. When Tibet cools down, the sinking air forces the air out of China and HK air is dirty.
This last typhoon cleared the air somewhat because it was to the west of HK so the air was once again coming off the ocean.
This only pertains to the upper level pollutants (the ones that make it so you can't see the horizon); obviously the air coming out of China has nothing to do with the ground level stuff caused by the cars and other local pollution producers.
And I would say for the last few weeks the pollution has been worse than it was all last winter. So it (probably) won't always be as bad, but you won't see good again until the summer.
 
Hi

I moved here (Shekou in Shenzhen) last year November from Germany. We live right across the Bay from Hong Kong. Over the winter months the visibility here was entirely different than what I had been used to in Europe and the years I lived in the USA. However -I always knew that the climate of the South China Sea is something entirely different and it is not the pollution that causes it. It is just really hazy.

Pollution does not go away in summer to return in fall. Local pollution is primarily at the street level and if you have a baby -mine is 22 months -he/she will most likely be even closer to the ground and breathe in all that micro dust from trucks and older cars - the really nasty stuff.

We live high up in a high rise to be away from the street level as much as possible. The fact that Hong Kong and our part of Shenzhen are surrounded by the sea really lowers the pollution. I can't imagine what it would be like to live in Guangzhou or some of the big heavy industry cities of the interior.

The new bridge and road from Hong Kong to Shenzhen on our side at the foot of NanShan mountain has a new huge outdoor screen monitor that shows the actual air quality with several values on the screen and always updated instantly. It is not as bad as I thought. So don't take the visibility as an indicator of pollution levels. And try tom keep babies away from the street level as much as possible.

Paul
 
thinking of getting an air purifier. i know that iq air has dominated the market and that it is very expensive. has anyone heard of the hepa filter+ UV light air cleaners? There is one called TRACS from Pyramid. Anyone have any experience with this?
 
In my pollution shock I bought an IQair - very expensive and it just seems to filter down to minute particles size - the salesman had a handheld pollution meter which showed the amount of minute particles in the air really decreased with it on, however I don't know whether the particles are pollution, dust, or humidity. I think the air is cleaner in the apartment with it but then I find the aircon helps too. I don't know whether a HEPA filter will work as the particular pollution in the air from China is a special type - not like allergens (pollen) which are filtered by HEPA. So I don't know. I find there is very little information available on the pollution and levels etc. There is no measurement for the Southside and given the government officials claim the pollution is getting better they are obviously not going to divulge more information.
I haven't found anything on the web either that is objective about air purifiers and pollution. Please post if you know any more.
I am relieved that the pollution is not normally this bad and some of it is haze but it does make me want to leave sooner.
I think it will ultimately affect Hong Kong's prosperity.
 
I agree with you Ali71, the pollution will definitly affect HK's prosperity. With no natural resources to sell the only thing going for HK is that it has made itself into a financial hub. This is already changing however with Singapore getting it's act together and attracting the same people that HK used to attract before the pollution got this bad. HK will be nothing without its expats and foreign workers.
 
I couldn't agree more. It's really terrible. We're considering leaving Hong Kong now as a result - I have developed mild asthma myself and now we have a little one on the way in Feb, it's a real concern. I just received a job offer from Dubai and went there to check it out last week - although it's still hot there of course (the end of the summer) the air felt so fresh in comparison to HK. I felt so much better within hours of getting there.

I lived in London for 10 years and was in Tokyo for a number of years too, so it's not like I'm comparing the pollution here to a rural area. The HK government really need to get off their arses and make and then implement some serious measures to help. Simply watching the HK Observatory list air pollution as "Very High" day after day (and we know their standard is lower than the rest of the world anyway) just won't cut it anymore!
 
I agree that Pollution is very bad here. My husband has lived here for 14 years and developped Asthma due to pollution, But to say that HK is nothing without expats and foreign workers is a bit insensitive to the local Chinese population. I am not Chinese and I am a foreigner living here, But status of HK as a financial hub and its closeness to Mainland will always be beneficial to HK. I am sure the pollution levels has effected a lot people decison to migrate from here but still I think there a lot more people coming to HK also
 
Neha, I have to politely disagree. HK cannot be an international financial centre without foreigners. If the majority of foreign professionals move to Singapore, (as an example), HK will be unable to compete - with or without the mainland pulling it along. For any major city to be considered a financial and international hub it must attract foreign workers. London does, New York does, Dubai does, Hong Kong currently does. This is not a slight on Hong Kong or the locals, it's just reality. Dubai wasn't the mammoth economy it currently is when only locals lived there.
 
I agree with u that u need foreign talent in the city, But my point is u feel that pollution is a hindrance to foreign talent coming to HK, but there a lot of foreigners coming here inspite of the pollution. What I am trying to say is that money is huge incentive for people ( huge expats salaries packages) to forget aboutthe pollution for a coupleof years .To be a succesfull financial centre u need money which HK has abundant of. HSI has gone up more than 15% ina month whereas STI alot less.

I am sure there alot of foreigners who are packing their packs moving their families out of HK due to the pollution but there a lot more trying to move into HK and get a piece of China. China in the next 30-40 years will be the worlds largest economy.
 
I am not sure whether it's just miscommunication but the comment of "HK will be nothing without its expats and foreign workers" is a little grating and insulting to my ears. Let's be honest, it has always been a case of expats and foreign workers being attracted to HK cos of the excellent pay package and low tax, not that HK needs expats and foreign workers and cannot function without them. There are plenty of Chinese who are educated abroad with exactly the same/higher qualification as the expats you mentioned. It'd be great if the air can get cleaner and pollution may deter some expats from coming to HK and but their absence will not tumble HK as have been suggested in this thread. Also, even from this site alone, it seems lots of aussies are still coming to HK despite the pollution and there is no mass exodus as is portrayed.
 
I've been following this thread and I have to chime in here. First, pollution is a huge problem when it comes to expat workers. For example, my husband needs American bar licensed attornies to come to Hong Kong and help work on deals. Hong Kong companies that list on the exchange here all have US private placement components that REQUIRE US attornies. Not HK registered, UK registered, etc. And these people need to reside in Hong Kong because there is so much work out here to be done and this still is very much a face to face business culture. Most HK and Chinese companies are getting the bulk of their money from the US. He has been trying for over two years to get people to come out here and the truth of the matter is that no matter what the sum of money is....and believe me it's huge, people with families (and some without) do not want to live in Hong Kong. Hong Kong's pollution makes news in the US!!!! Believe me, I get forwarded the articles, etc. from my mother all the time.

Pollution is a huge problem and we will leave because of it and trust me we're not the only ones. We have a new baby and there isn't really any amount of money that would get me to stay.

So instead of us arguing about it, everyone here needs to do their part to conserve energy and get involved in reducing the level of pollutants. It may not make a huge impact, but at least it sends a message that we're concerned and the government needs to do something about it. I love living in Hong Kong and it saddens me that there are days I don't go outside because I don't want my daughter breathing the air.
 
To Neha's point about people moving here to try to get a piece of China, while that may be true now, it isn't going to be that way for long. What is happening already is that the focus is slowly shifting from Hong Kong north to Shanghai. Why use HK as a gateway to China when firms can actually now be located in China? Very large US law firms, banks, etc are not opening offices in Hong Kong but they are going straight to Shanghai and Beijing. If we stayed in HK, we'd have to relocate to Shanghai in a few years for this very reason.

Also to whoever was saying regardless of pollution, expats will come for lower taxes, etc....it obviously depends on individual circumstances and our overly complicated tax system, but in general US citizens pay virtually the same amount of tax as they would in the states because we are taxed on our worldwide income. And to be honest, I've heard from friends here recently that some US firms aren't offering the same kind of lucrative expat packages. They are still good, but nothing like they used to be.

Slightly off the pollution topic, but even more incentive to clean up the air I think.

Enjoy this lovely day. I can see blue sky!
 
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