Orange Alert for Beijing Smog

Beijing issued its first orange smog alert ahead of winter on Friday, forecasting heavy air pollution over the next four days, the second-highest alert in China’s four-tier emergency response system. Vehicles with National I and II emission standards and trucks transporting waste earth and construction debris will be banned from roads between Nov. 4 and Nov. 8, according to a notice posted on Weather.com—a website affiliated with China’s National Meteorological Administration, Reuters reported. Large parts of northern China suffer from chronic smog during the bitterly cold winters because much of the heating demand is still met by coal. Pollution alerts during the winter pollution season are common in the region—a problem that the government has struggled to solve despite a multi-year effort.