Beijing wants to keep 'APEC blue'

Beijing plans to phase out around 1million vehicles with low emission standards, a move toward allowing residents to enjoy the same good air quality experienced during the recent APEC meeting.

Fang Li, deputy chief of the Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau, said that getting rid of the 1 million vehicles with emission standards meeting the National Phase I and II - equivalent to Euro 1 and 2 - would greatly reduce air pollutants.

To guarantee a clean sky during the APEC meeting, Beijing took a series of measures targeting vehicles from Nov 3 to 12, such as restricting the use of private cars based on their license plates, keeping 70 percent of public vehicles for governments and institutions off the road, and banning work trucks.