API-based assessment on urban air environment bearing capability in China

Given the complexity and time-consuming of the conventional environmental capacity based assessment on air environment carrying capacity; a new method for assessing urban air environment carrying capacity based on air pollution index (API) is presented. By using this new method, the air environmental bearing capability of 333 cities at the prefecture level and above is assessed. The results show that of the 333 cities 9.6% is of high bearing capability, 34.5% relatively high bearing capability, 52.6% medium bearing capability, 2.7% low capability, and 0.6% is of weak bearing capability; in terms of regional distribution, the western region is of relatively high air environment bearing capability, followed by north-eastern and eastern regions, and the ambient air quality in the middle region is quite poor; among the 12 urban agglomerations in key regions, Pearl River delta, west side of Taiwan Strait and Chengdu-Chongqing agglomerations are of relatively high carrying capacity while other agglomerations are of medium bearing capability. The assessment results imply that the existing air quality standard (GB3095-1996) is quite unsound.